Christmas in Vegas

We decided back in November that we were going to stay here for Christmas. It was a combination of reasons really... some of which include:

a) Not wanting to drive in potentially bad weather

b) Wanting to get more sleep than what we usually end up with when we travel (didn't quite happen)

c) Not having to feel rushed or feeling like we need to see more people than we already have
So instead, we invited Gram Jan and Papa Mike (Tennille's parents) up to spend the weekend with us. And while I was a little sad not to see more family, I think we had an enjoyable time.

(Our haul... we were blessed to get so many nice things from so many nice people)

Early Christmas Eve we opened Kira's "God-father" Henry's gifts. He spoils her! She got a magna doodle, some food for her kitchen and a Curious George Light-up doll. She loves it!

Gram Jan and Papa Mike came up late Christmas Eve. We hung out and did some minor preparations for the next day and headed off to bed. Christmas morning, Kira was ready to go, not because she knew it was Christmas (she's 2) but because GRAM JAN was here!

Do we ran out to the living room, changed a diaper and Kira jumped on to her new bike/motorcycle (depends on the day and if she feels like making noises)

After Kira saw what Santa left her we moved onto stockings and Kira got some great stuff...

A Maisy book and some sippys and some match-box cards!

After stockings, we went straight to gifts!

Wearing her new jacket, and tiara

Opening Curious George from Dallin, Kyla, Garrett and Corinne. It has been on since we opened it.

An Elmo book!

Her Christmas morning outfit! All the great girlie things she got!

Her microwave from Granjan and Papa Mike... she loves it!

Her ornament from Uncle Bruce and Aunt Cheryl.

A happy girl!

Her haul.... Thanks everyone! She loved everything!

Christmas overload!


Kira's Christmas outfit!

After gifts and naps we started on dinner. I made my first Ham and it was wonderful! We used Alton Brown's city ham recipe and it was fantastic! We also had salad, veggies, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffing and.... Duck. Yep, Jacob made a duck. It was better than the duck I have ever had before but I'm still not going to go out of my way to make/eat it.

Kira pushing her baby in her new stroller! She's a good mommy!

We had a great Christmas! We hope you all did too! We thank you all for your love and support and wish you all the best for 2010! Happy New Year!

Pictures of Kira

Jacob has been taking some fun pictures of Kira lately. No reason behind them except that Kira is super cute so along with the pictures I'll share some funny Kira moments.

Today-

Tennille: "Oh Kira, you are so funny!"

Kira: "Yeah, Boppa is a goofball!"

(For those of you who don't know... Boppa is a nickname she gave herself)

Yesterday - I woke up to her pounding her bedroom wall singing... "Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle all the way... HAY!"

Beginning of the month:

Tennille: "Kira, what are you doing?"

Kira: "Eating Elmo's boogers!"

When she picks up Daddy's phone:

Kira: "Hi Mater/Cars/Ariel/Elmo/Ernie! What you doing Mater/Cars/Ariel/Elmo? Bye!

I don't know how well you can tell, but she put the camera on the guitar stand and said "Ok, stand still....... cheese!"

I'm not sure why Jacob put her on the fridge but she had a great time up there!

"Mom Mom!!!!.... look... Kira on fridge!"

I'm guessing she's a martial arts monkey fighter?

This is like my best picture ever.... 3 of my favorite things combined.... Jacob taking the picture, Kira in the picture and Mountain Dew..... to bad I'm not having any after 1/1/10

Oh the sweet nectar of the gods... what will I ever do without you?

only 5 days until Gramjan and Papa Mike get here... Kira is SO excited!

Kira meet Santa........

She was excited when he came to visit us at our ward party and even excited to get a candy cane but not so excited when it came to sitting on his lap....But she told Auntie M on the phone that she meet Santa and even her "god-father" Henry that she saw Santa yesterday. So I guess she's was excited to see him but not so excited to actually meet him!

On the other hand she stood up with all the primary children and "sang" their Christmas song with them.......

Thanksgiving Weekend

Our Thanksgiving Weekend was so much fun! We started out Thursday with pulling out Christmas Decorations and putting up some of them. We watched some football and then headed off to the Merrill's house at around 2:30. We hung out with Shelly while we waited for Ryan to get home from work. Once Ryan got home we jumped into food mode. Jacob and Ryan did the fried turkey (it was so good!) and the rest of us chipped in making different things. I made the Green Bean Casserole and messed it up and Jacob made the yummy mashed potatoes that he thinks he messed up... so our contributions weren't as great as we wanted them to be but dinner was great! After dinner we watched more football and waited until it was time for dessert. After dessert we headed home.

On Friday we planned to go to the Titanic exhibit at the Luxor. Jacob got free tickets at a Car Show earlier in the year and they needed to be used before December 31st. So off we went to the Luxor. Local tickets are $24.00 or $27.00 for tourists. I'm not sure I would have been as happy with the exhibit if I would have paid that much but Jacob and I enjoyed it very much. They had some pretty awesome stuff, plates, mirrors, sinks, postcards etc. They gave us each a card with information about a passenger and at the end you can see if you lived or not. Kira and I lived, Jacob did not.

After the Luxor we headed off to the Bellagio. They change their flower garden every quarter and we caught the last weekend of the fall display.

Kira didn't like the talking tree so much.

Bellagio also has the World Largest Chocolate Fountain.. which was kinda cool and a little gross at the same time.

After the chocolate fountain we headed out to the water fountains..... Kira has never really liked them but likes the music. So we walked out and watched a water show

The Bellagio does a water show every 15 minutes or so to a different song each time. It was fun to watch.

Then on Saturday we went to the Motor Trend Auto Show, we got free tickets from 7-11 so we thought we would check it out. It was WAY smaller than the Auto Shows in Los Angeles and even smaller than the one in Anaheim but we had fun anyway. Jacob looked at trucks (his is running out of steam) and I am still covetting the Ford Flex. Kira had so much fun at the Auto Show she got to get inside the cars and drive and press buttons, the only way to get her out of one car was to promise her there would be another.

CHEESE!

We were a little sorry for our fun weekend to be over, but real life always comes to take over.

We hope you all had as fun of a weekend as we did! We hope the spirit of this season finds your home and family.

Fun things

Being Kira's mom is seriously one of the funniest things that has ever happened to me. She is so hilarious! She is currently watching Disney's morning cartoons and singing along and yelling "Oh toodles!" One of the other things I love is that it is ALWAYS an adventure to open my kitchen cabinets. You may remember this post (click if you don't, it's worth it!) from last year. We have since child proofed the food cabinets but we never got around to the others (the one under the kitchen sink is done too, incase you were wondering) so every once in a while I will open my cabinet and find this...

The other day I opened the same cabinet and found crayons in there. I'm not really sure why she does this, maybe she's just saving things for later but every time I open a cabinet and find sippy cups in with my pots and pans or a puzzle piece in my muffin tins I chuckle a little and am thankful to have her in our home.

Last week I couldn't find the remote for a good 30 minutes until I went to look in her kitchen, it was in the oven!!

Kira is such a joy and Jacob and I feel so blessed to have been given the opportunity to her her parents.

5 Years Married 8 years together

Every year at this time Jacob and I celebrate a double anniversary, our 5th year being married and our 8th year being together. And as I sit here and contemplate how I'm going to make this post different than 2008s post I think really it's just important to celebrate this milestone. So I'm going to repeat some of this stuff again.

Jacob and I started dating near the end of November. He first took me to a bar to listen to some compilation of some guy from Dinosauar Jr. with another guy from Porno for Pyros with some other guy from who know's what. I don't really remember who they were.... what I do remember though is that we had a really fun time, even though he didn't get any kissin' at the end of the date (for those of you who know that story.. the onion rings were terrific!) After that he asked me to go to some work Holiday Party with him. And we actually have a picture of that.... (how many people can say they have a picture of their second date?)

(Don't you love my purse?)

In between that time we hit a really bad movie too but from that second date on we were pretty much inseparable. We knew pretty early on that we wanted to get married but we wanted to do it the right way... meaning we wanted to live on our own. NO parents, NO grandparents just us in our own place and that meant we had a lot of debt to pay off first. Most of it mine (what can I say? I had a lot of fun shopping and traveling?!... isn't that what you are supposed to do in your twenties?) So we worked for 2 1/2 years to get that paid off before we got engaged. We also did some other fun things.....

We spent a lot of time at Disneyland.

I took him to Ohio to meet my parents and siblings

We went to England, for a wedding we missed (still makes me a little sad)

And we spent a lot of time together!

We got engaged on March 18th 2004 and the poor Anderson family had 3 weddings in one year! (Jacob's brother and sister got married in April and May of that same year)

We got married November 20th 2004 at the very packed Los Angeles Temple (17 weddings that day.... we got married an hour after our appointment)

In the last 5 years we have had 3 jobs changes, 2 apartments and moved 241 miles. We have had our good times and our bad times, we have a beautiful little girl who brings more love to our family than we had ever thought possible. I am so thankful that the Lord brought Jacob to me. I am so thankful that Jacob didn't give up in the 8 months between when he got home from his mission and when I finally agreed to go out with him. I'm thankful for a man who loves me even when I am crazy, in a bad mood, being a bad wife or just having a bad day. I'm thankful for a man who works hard for his family and who is faithful in the gospel of Christ. He makes me a better person. Jacob, I love you!!!