Sunday, December 11, 2011

Thankful for Family

Joe and I were blessed to be able to spend a week in Utah with my family, and to get to spend Thanksgiving there! As always, we had a blast and enjoyed our little getaway. Time always goes by twice as fast when we're there. We got there Friday November 18th. Those that could go that night went with us to a little Taqueria for dinner. We had so much fun and the food was great! (Michael joined us after this picture was taken)

After dinner we went back to my parent's house and just hung out. I got some special play time in with Tate. He loves this little race track my mom bought. I have missed him so much! I loved being able to watch him run around, make the sweetest little noises, and listen to the new words he's started to say. What a sweetheart!

Saturday morning we woke up to this! Snow!!! It was nice to have it snow while we were there. It was also nice to have it melt and not stick to the roads=)
Saturday afternoon Tiff, Michael, Joe and I headed up to Park City to the Tanger Outlets and then stopped to see Joseph, Britt, and Korv at the Condo. They watched Braden while we left to meet my parents and Bob and Sharon in Heber to see The Forgotten Carols. It was SO wonderful to be able to go to that. Pretty sure I started crying the moment it started. Going to that has always been a tradition I have loved and I've really missed not being able to go the last couple years. It was so nice to take Joe and his parents and to have my family there. That is a tradition I will never tire of. After The Forgotten Carols, we drove back to Park City and met Joseph and Britt and her parents for dinner. I forgot to take pictures of everyone, but got a picture of Korv "making stew." It was so funny to watch him!
On Sunday we went to church with my parents and that evening everyone came over to celebrate "Griffin Thanksgiving." Somehow we're off with the rest of my family on their holiday rotation so we celebrated it early with everyone and then on actual Thanksgiving we went to dinner with my parents.

Here are some pics from dinner. Notice my mom in the background=)
Tiff looks great! Notice mom again=)
This picture is blurry, but Dal had to do his signature pose. Looks like Joseph was mesmerized.=)
Awww=) Me and my little Dillan!
Being silly!

After dinner I had to get pictures with my 3 boys! They are so stinkin' adorable! I couldn't get enough of them! Love this picture with Tate and Braden smiling!
This is a picture from Christmas last year of Tate and Korv. Look at how big they've gotten! I can't believe how little they were last year!
Another picture from this year. I can't imagine our family without these 3!
The boys just chillin' after dinner.
Tate made me laugh so hard. Tiff was laying just like this watching this video my dad put on, and Tate just went over and plopped himself down on her belly! So cute!
Uncle Michael and the boys! They love the race track!
While in Utah, our second anniversary rolled around. Funny story behind these next few pictures. So, my mom told us that she still had our wedding cake in the freezer in the garage. She set it out on a cake plate. Well, we went to take a picture of us cutting into it. After the picture we were taking off the ribbon to cut it, and I realized "Uh, we didn't have black ribbon on our wedding cake, and our cake was square not round!" So, turns out it was Tiff's cake from 3 years ago that they had never cut! Ha ha ha!
We had to document Tiff cutting the cake! Michael wasn't there so Joe thought it would be funny to fill in for him=)
Tiff cutting her cake all by herself=( Sorry Dillan! We should have realized it earlier. Also, for those of you wondering.....we did NOT eat the 3 year old cake!=)
I got some cute pictures of my sweet nephews. I can't tell you how much I love and miss them! I just wanted to soak up every second I could!

On Monday Brittany had an appointment and needed someone to watch Tate. I was so excited!! Tiff and I took him with us to Joann's and he kept us laughing the entire time! He was playing peek-a-boo with us behind Braden's car seat. Look at that smile! It just melts my heart!
Then we headed to the paint isle and he decided he wanted to help pick out paint colors. SO FUNNY!!!
He got bored with the paint and picked up this foam brush. Dal said he has helped him paint before. He knew just what to do!=)
The little guy was tuckered out after all that fun!
This was Wednesday before they left for Arizona. Saying bye bye. I HATE saying bye! This time when I left I held it together until we got in the truck here in Houston and started to head home. Then I just started bawling! I miss those boys SO much!

Korver was cracking me up! He LOVES playing in the kitchen, and especially the pantry. He would sit there and go in and out. Then he wanted me to turn the light on and off. I swear he could have done it for hours! After about 30 minutes, I was done=) Look at him in the pic! Doesn't his face just make you laugh!?
I looked in a few minutes later and he had found a water bottle. He made the crockpot his chair. SO FUNNY! Korv is such a funny kid. I can't help but laugh whenever I hear him laugh. He's a busy body, just like his dad was. I love hearing his new words. Love that he still has 4 teeth. That smile is so adorable! I had so much fun playing trucks with him. He's a total boy!
Tuesday we headed over to Tiff's to help her with a few things at her apartment. Joe and I put up some vinyl lettering for her in Braden's room. It turned out so cute!

Another project I did was make that green pillow cover! I have never made one before and it ended up being a lot of fun! I just watched some lady on youtube do it and followed along!=) I ended up making two green ones and 1 blue to coordinate with that decorative pillow. I can't wait to make some for my house! It was really easy.
On Thanksgiving morning Tiff picked me up and we went to Old Navy. They were opened on Thanksgiving and were having an outerwear sale. I wanted this cute leather looking jacket so we went. Funny thing is we thought they opened at 9 so we got there about 8:30 because we weren't sure if there would be a line or not. There wasn't anyone there so we just sat in the car and did our make-up and chatted. Well, around 8:50 we saw this lady just walk in and start shopping. We headed to the door and realized they had opened at 8! Oh well, we got some good sister chat time in=)

They gave away these 3D glasses and Tiff had the brilliant idea to take a picture with the mannequins. It's like "where's waldo?" Can you find us?=)
Thanks for going with me Little Dillan! I had so much fun!
On actual Thanksgiving Day we decided we didn't want to cook for just the 4 of us so we went to Mimi's for lunch. My dad had called a million restaurants and hardly anyone was open. If they were they were only serving turkey dinner. The boys were tired of turkey and wanted something different so Mimi's it was. We ended up having a lot of fun! Mom and I got turkey and the boys got regular menu items. Thanks dad for a great Thanksgiving dinner!=) That evening Aunt Terri and the kids came over and we made egg rolls. My dad likes to make about 100-150 at a time because they are so time consuming. Then he freezes most of them and pulls them out throughout the year. It didn't take long with all of these hands helping, and they were fabulous!!

Ashley stopped by that evening for a few minutes. So fun to see her!
Tiff had to work Thanksgiving, but when she got off she came to my parent's house and took a little nap before we headed out for Black Friday Madness! She wanted to go to Kohls. We've done that a few times and pretty much have it down to a science. The line when we got there wrapped around the building! It opened at midnight, which is so much better than 5 am! Once we got inside we started shopping until we saw the lines starting to get long. Then I stood in line while she shopped and then we'd switch. Joseph's Britt was there too! She was one of the first ones in and checked out! Then she came back in again and shopped with us. We had so much fun! Tiff got several pairs of pants and some really cute jewelry! Britt got an awesome deal on luggage! I'm so glad I got to go with them! This picture is Tiff and me waiting in line before it opened!
Friday morning Tiff and I went to DSW and Nordstrom Rack. Then we stopped and picked up Braden from Michael and hung out at my parents' for a bit. I love this picture because you can see Tiff in the mirror. So funny!
Braden is such a sweetheart! When he smiles he kind of gets bashful and leans into your shoulder. He is such an easy going boy, and is so sweet. I love watching his little personality come out as he's gotten older. He's such a cuddle bug! I soaked that up, because he won't like to cuddle for too long!
At Cafe Rio!
Joe made that hat out of a napkin. SO FUNNY!!! He loves little Braden! He loves that he can get him to smile. So sweet! This picture makes me laugh!
Saying goodbye=(

We had such a fun time. As always, I should have taken more pictures. Thank you everyone for taking time to hang out with us. We always feel so loved whenever we're home. Thank you Mom and Dad for having us, and for being so much fun to be with. We love coming to visit. We miss you all!

Monday, November 28, 2011

Fan Makeover

Joe went to Dallas a couple weekends ago to spend time with his brother and to bring back some furniture for Serena. Anthony also gave Joe a ceiling fan they were getting rid of. Joe being the little handyman that he is, and me being the crafty woman I try to be.....well, we gave the fan a make over. In all fairness, Joe did most of it. I just helped here and there. =) Joe can't let projects that need to be done sit for too long. He's the "get er' done" type of guy. We put up the Christmas tree and decorations last Saturday, and before we were completely finished and everything was put away, he was working on the fan. I should have taken a before and after picture but I found one online to kind of give you an idea of the before=) It wasn't exactly like this. The lights are different, and the fan blades had more of a wood look not a painted look.

SO, here's the before......

And here it is now

There's nothing a little spray paint can't change!=) We used Oil Rubbed Bronze on the fan and on the blades we used Almond. It turned out so well! We moved the other fan we had in here to our guest bedroom. The only lighting we had in that bedroom was from one dinky little lamp, so it's SO much better now! We love the new fan! Thanks Anthony and Julie!