Halloween 2008!!

Halloween was great fun. We had a ward Trunk-or-treat and went to our friend's, The Nielson's for their annual Halloween Party complete with trailer rides and lots of yummy Chili. Lizzy was a "Ballerina Bunny", Ryan was Batman (we used the Batman Mexican Wrestler mask and cape that we brought back from Mexico in September) and Trevor was a Pirate. We went trick-or-treating with my good friend Angela and her little boy, Jason. Jason is Ryan best friend ever. He's such a cute kid.

Clare's cake...

This was a cake for Lizzy's best friend, Clare. These two are inseperable. They had a purse party. Lizzy loved it. 1 hour before I had to deliver this cake (a couple houses down the street) Trevor decided that he now knew how to open the fridge and yanked the handle off the purse. Here is Lizzy with her friends. Clare is the Drama Queen down in front in the picture where they are showing off their nails. We love Clare.

Pupkin Patch Pics

We LOVE Halloween and Fall in Utah! It is my absolute FAVORITE season. I just LOVE the colors, festivities, food and all the baking that goes on. We especially love going to the Pumpkin patch! We got to go twice this year. Once was our family outing (without daddy, he was in New Mexico, I think, on business. He really missed it. He loves going too. We sent him lots of pics, though.) and the other time was with Ryan's pre-school group. They had a blast going in the hay-bale maze and picking out pumpkins.



In this collage: Ryan's pre-schoool group: Logan, Ryan, Chiya, Hallie & Rachel.
After all the Pumkin Patch fun...We got to carve! I think Trevor had the most fun with the seeds...

THE CRUISE!!

I'm finally blogging about the cruise that Jacob and I took at the end of September.

Jacob and I took a 5 day cruise on the Royal Caribbean. We went to San Diego, Catalina and Ensenada, Mexico. I still can't get over how fun it was. When I say "Jacob and I" I really mean Jacob, and I AND 14 of our closest friends! 8 couples from our neighborhood (16 people in all!) all decided to go together and it could not have been more fun. If you are going to go on a cruise, go with friends...it makes for some awesome times!

Day 1:

Day one consisted of flying to L.A., Hitting In-N-Out (of course), getting on the boat, playing basket ball and ping-pong and then settling in for the fantastic food at dinner time while we set sail. Here's a pic of all of our "Happy Cruise Faces" when we got on the ship.


Day 2:

On day 2 we ported in beautiful San Diego. Of course I've been there many times but one thing that I always wanted to do was go Kayaking in La Jolla Cove. This was SO much fun!! I highly suggest doing it for all of you that still live there! We took our snorkel gear and underwater camera with us. And the best part...WE SWAM WITH SHARKS!! Okay, so they were just harmless leopard sharks that swam away when you got too close but they were still 3 to 5 feet long! SO FUN! We even saw a ton of seals and sea lions just relaxing and playing on a rock. Two other couples joined us while the rest of the group went to do sealings at the San Diego temple.

These are the sharks we saw... (kinda merky water and a bad underwater camera) Can you see him?
This is what a leapord shark really looks like...

We got back on the boat where we got ready for the Formal dinner (again, so fun), then headed off to go rock climbing on the top deck.

The funniest part of this day was when Jacob and I got picked to be part of the Newlywed Game on the ship. They picked the couple that had been married the longest, the couple that had been married the shortest amount of time and then they picked us. To get on the show, they told us that the girl had to say: "Tarzan, Tarzan you're my man! Take me to the stage" and the man had to do the Tarzan yell. A ton of couples stood to compete. A couple of people did it but they were nervous. When they got to us, I stood on my chair and in a super dramatic fashion, said my line. Then (without consulting me) Jacob threw me over his shoulder to do his yell. The audience erupted and all the other competitors sat down. It was a fun game and we totally won! We were even given a DVD of it. Day 3:

CATALINA!! We all rented bikes and cruised the island. Then we found this awesome beach that no one else was at and hung out. We then got back on our bikes and headed off to find some lunch (pineapple hot dogs...yum!) then went to Lover's Cove for the best snorkeling ever. TONS and tons of fish! In fact...too many fish. For some reason, when I got in the water (it must have been my bright yellow bathing suit) the fish literally SWARMED me! I'm talking about hundreds of fish! I would swim away and when I turned around, they all turned at the same time to look at me with their fish eyes! Talk about creepy!! Seriously eerie people....that's when I got out.

Then we got back to the boat for yet another night of Karaoke and yummy food. The tall guy that Kris and I are taking a picture with is Daryl. The funnest cruise entertainers ever. We totally wanted to take him home and go shopping, get our nails done and just have such a fun girls night! We LOVED Daryl.

Then of course, our usual late night pizza and games. Oh, and if you are wondering why Jacob is wearing that hidious mullet wig, it's because we all gave eachother "Dares" before we went. Jacob's dare was to wear this wig at dinner. He took it to a whole new level when he borrowed my friend's tank top, donned the mullet and did a rendition of "I feel like making Love" at Karaoke that night. Leave it to Jacob to never do anything low key...

Day 4:

Ensenada!! Fantastic tacos, two of the funniest tour guides (we called one of them Knoxville because he TOTALLY looked like Johnny Knoxville) and some fun shopping. Plus, the beach was waist deep like 1/2 a mile out. We loved our tour guides. Then back on the ship for dinner again and a scavenger hunt in which we all took 3rd. (Some other people cheated.) This game had us all rolling! The same night, we also all competed in the game"Finish the Lyric" where we totally took gold. I swear, people thought we were drunk on that cruise because we were all having so much fun.

Day 5:

Going home... You would think this would be a sad thing but really, we all had such a good time and left feeling fulfilled. We were all so excited to see our kids again and couldn't wait to get home so we could share stories about the trip that we just took. Since we checked out of the ship in the morning, and a lot of us had the same flight home, we went to the mall, went to the movies to see "Eagle Eye" (very good, btw) and went to dinner.

Oh! Guess who was on our flight home?! KATHERINE HEIGEL!! Yup, Katherine Heigel was on our flight! (Why she was flying Jet Blue was a mystery to me but whatever...) Just a bit before we noticed her, my friend held up a magazine and said, "Hey, isn't she Mormon?" (She was baptized as a teenager but obviously isn't active anymore.) I looked over my shoulder and there she was...just sitting, reading a book in the back trying to be inconspicuous. My friend took a quick Paparazzi shot before she really got noticed and people started swarming her.

What a fun trip. So many amazing memories were made and close friendships were made even closer. Fun, fun!

A Tribute to my M.I.L...

Happy (belated) Birthday Mom! There is a reason why I call my Mother-in-law "Mom". She treats me like her own. She is always so loving and thoughtful. She always thinks of cute things to do for others that just cheer a person up. She gives the most thoughtful birthday presents. She is an amazing "Namma" to my babies and they can't get enough of her. She comes up to visit us at least 2 times a year; once in the springtime to help me plant my garden (she's an amazing gardener) and then in December so that we can have our own little mini-Christmas. Sometimes we even get to go to Women's Conference together. She is so creative, so talented and such a genuine person. She gives Jacob and I the space we need to be a couple and raise our kids on our own but still is always there to offer any advice or help that we need without being intrusive or pushy. I couldn't have asked for a better Mother-in-law. Thank you, Mom. Thanks for laughing so much. Thanks for not being easily offended. Thanks for raising an incredible son. Thanks for having self-confidence and passing it onto my daughter. Thanks for being a fantastic Namma. Thanks for always being honest. Thanks for always taking us out to dinner. Thanks for all the good times. Thanks for being easy to love. Thanks for loving me. I love you tons! Happy Birthday!