It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas!

Thanksgiving this year was a hit (even though I didn't get a single picture of the event)! We spent it with the Higgy's, York's, and Painter's. Such a big family event, I've never been apart of a Thanksgiving dinner with that many people! I've also never been a part of a game of Liar's Dice with so many people either. It was so much fun to spend time with all of the family and we were stuffed with delicious food!

On Thanksgiving we were also able to cut down our own Christmas tree. This is a tradition me and the hubs have started since last year and I know it is something we will look forward to every year. There's something so authentic about going out in the woods in the snow, picking out your very own tree, and chopping it down (though I don't do much chopping). I also did not have my camera to take pictures of this momentous event, hopefully next year!

Black Friday is also another tradition Tyler and I started last year. We go CRAZY! We are such a good team when it comes to shopping for other people and getting our Christmas shopping done. Both Black Friday years we have come home with 90% of people's presents. We also were able to get some presents for each other in the mix. Gotta love waking up at 5 a.m. in the morning to shop for some good deals.

And finally, after a super busy weekend, we got our house and tree decorated and ready for Christmas. I am a big fanatic about getting the house looking perfect for Christmas. Needless to say, I haven't cooked a meal in the past few days... but here we are:

All time favorite decoration I have ever made: The Grinch!

 Christmas Village

 Tyler did the lights at the bottom of the tree and I took it upon myself to finish off the top. Is it weird that we put the star on top of the tree before anything else? I think we just dread that it won't stand straight or the tree is too tall for us to get it on.

 Decorating! With Christmas music playing in the background of course.

 The finished product! We love our tall, quirky tree.

 We finished our night off by drinking egg nog and watching Elf :) I love Christmas!

 Also, Tyler painted our kitchen! Does it not look awesome!? He took the whole task on by himself and it looks perfect. I'm super happy with the color.

Let the parties begin!

I love spending time with family. With Thanksgiving coming around, I'm thinking about things that I am most grateful for. What most often comes to mind is the wonderful people I have in my life. I am truly blessed! I especially love it when the holiday season comes around, we have almost every weekend full of being with family and friends. This time of the year definitely brings us all together. 

The first of our holiday season parties was at Linda's, who invited us over for a pot luck dinner so that we could all get together and draw names for Christmas presents this year. Everyone brought delicious food and it definitely got us excited for Christmas and the gift exchange! 

Here's Kip, Joy, and Dustin

 Tyler was super excited about the prime rib Randy and Jo brought! Thanks guys for bringing Tyler's favorite meal that I never make :)

 Linda, Randy, and Jo

 The cute couple

 The cuter couple ;) Just teasing! My hair makes me look like Heidi from the movie... Heidi :) probably don't do that hair style again (note to self).

 Not sure who took this picture but, of course, Holly was part of the festivities as well.

Then it was my momma's birthday!! We went to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and were lucky to be able to have Owen and Elle and Hillary join us. Too bad I forgot to pull out the camera! But it was a blast, and any party is great when it involves cheesecake!

Opening presents at our new humble abode.

 We got her a nook! She was so excited about it and, I must admit, I'm a little jealous! Those things are cool!

 Happy birthday momma! We love you and are so lucky to have you as our mom. 

Remember that table I was redoing? Well, here it is totally complete and put in our new place! We are in love with it! Can't wait to do more pieces of furniture later on. 

DIY Christmas Wreath

Since we have moved in, we've been having lots of fun hanging out with some of our friends that we now live closer to. We're also very lucky to have our friends Jake and Haley to go to church with, we love that! Our weekend was full of little get-togethers and catching up. It also was full of crafting! My favorite thing :)

I'm used to painting little things, but my mom and I happened upon a $5 table at Savers that has inspired me to go big. I am now addicted to redoing furniture. But first I should finish my first attempt.

Here is the hideous table we found:

 An ugly brown with a random turquoise drawer... Well we started stripping the paint and I LOVED doing the stripping! It looked so cool how the paint bubbled up and all it took was a little scrape to get it clean off :) I know, I'm weird. Anyways this is what it turned out to be after we stripped AND my superhero of a husband got his electric sander and sanded it down for me. It's perfect! Next step is to paint it, which I haven't gotten to yet. Will post pictures of the finished product later.

 Now for the Christmas Wreath project. I found this on pinterest and fell in love! I got my mom and Holly to join in with me. This has been one of my most favorite projects I've ever done. It was super easy and super cheap. I thought I would stick with silver and champagne colors since I'm going to hang it inside my house over our silver mirror. Holly went with a splash of color and I love it! My mom ended up making a pine cone tree that turned out super cute as well. It was fun to get the girls together and make these. I can't wait to start decorating for Christmas!

ANNIVERSARY!! and MOVING!

So I was a picture-taking slacker over our anniversary which makes me a little mad. I did forget to pack my makeup so I guess I'm not too upset that I didn't take pictures of the weekend... We had a blast though!! Our anniversary was on Saturday the 29th so we packed up our things on Friday and headed up to Park City. We love going there for little romantic getaways.

We spent our weekend relaxing, watching movies, shopping, watching the U game, and eating out. Nothing too crazy, but so nice to get away for a little bit! Tyler definitely spoiled me by getting me a COACH purse (wow, never thought I would have one of those in a lifetime)!! He also got me my favorite perfume that I've been wanting for awhile.

Needless to say, I didn't do very good in the gift giving department.. for anyone who watches Modern Family, I'm like Claire who gave her husband 5 coupons for free hugs :) I didn't exactly do that gift but I made a candy poster for Tyler... BUT, to justify myself, he did want to a gun (for safety reasons I guess, whatever) so I'm splitting that gift between anniversary and Christmas since guns are a little pricey! It works :)

After the anniversary weekend was over, we came home to do a TON of packing. Our date to move was on Wednesday and, thanks to the help of tons of friends and family, we got the whole move done in one day and done super fast! We are so grateful for everybody's help, we could not have done it without them!

Since then we have been putting together our apartment and I'm going to have put some pictures up because we are in love with it!! It's so roomy and has tons of storage that we have put to good use. I have also taken on some new projects involving painting shelves and totally redoing a few pieces of furniture. I'm really excited to get it all done.

And finally, I was reading a friends blog today and she mentioned a talk by President Uchtdorf. I read it today and wow, talk about powerful. It was such a good message to read again that I want to share it with others. It's such a good reminder of the individual worth we all have and how Heavenly Father loves each of us. But one part stood out to me the most and that was where he talked about the couple who was the perfect example of Christ. I hope to one day be more like them and emulate Christ as they did. You can read the talk HERE