Cousins, cousins, cousins

I love my cousins. I have a lot of them. And great news for me, turns out a majority of them like to come to Arizona during this time of year!! Within a 2 week period, I was able to see and hang out with 5 different cousins!

LINDSEY:

Lindsey came first with her 2 girls and stayed in Mesa with her mom (my aunt Annie). I went down by myself (since Brody had some school work to do) and the 4 of us had a fun girls day.

We had a yummy dinner and a birthday party for Emma on Friday night,

Lindsey and I stayed up late that night chatting and catching up.

The next morning, I spent some time with the little ones while Lin got some things done. We played ponies and balloons.

Emma is quite the little shadow but it's so darling. At one point, she wrapped herself around my leg and wouldn't let go, so I just walked around like that for a little while. It was so cute.

Later, we went to Cheesecake Factory for lunch and had the most heavenly salad I've ever tasted.

Then we tossed pennies into the fountain (well Emma did and me and Lindsey took pictures)

To end the day, we went shopping for a bit and let Emma ride the carousel.

CLAIRE:

The next cousin to visit was Claire. She came down from New Mexico with her new 3 month old darling girl Lizzy. She stayed with her sister (my cousin Jordan) in Scottsdale. Brody and I went over one night for dinner and dessert. We had a yummy imitation of cafe rio sweet pork salad. It was delicious! It was so fun to see Claire and her new baby and for her and Brody to meet for real (weddings and farewells don't count). We had a great time hanging out and catching up with each other's lives! (I'm so sad I didn't get a picture!! I completely spaced it. Sorry Claire! But I did manage to steal one from Jordan)

STACEY AND SARA

Stacey and Sara came together and also stayed with Annie. Although they didn't stay at Annie's house, since they had to be moved out of their AZ house last week, and can't move to Utah till next week. She and Trace are staying at a friends 2 million dollar house. It was gorgeous! We met up first at Costa Vida for dinner and then went back to this huge house to relax, chat, veg and watch the Olympics. I was so happy about this because since we don't have TV we haven't been able to watch much of the winter games and that has made me so sad! Paul and DeNae also came over for a bit, and we just had a great time!

It was so much fun to see all these cousins and I'm glad I was able to spend some time with all these wonderful girls. (Oh and Brody had fun tagging along as well. I think.)

Love Day

We don't usually make a big deal of this holiday, but we do have a few small traditions that are kinda fun. For Valentine's Day, we buy humorous/joke cards for each other (the only time I ever buy pre-written cards in a store. They are selling some of those for $5!!!!) so that's something fun and entertaining to look forward to. I also make some sort of pink food, which isn't original or anything but we enjoy it. This year it was pink banana pancakes for breakfast and pink white chili for dinner.

We don't do a lot as far as presents go, but instead go out for dinner or some other fun activity.

Saturday night we went to Cheesecake Factory with our friends and went all out! All 3 couples bought an appetizer to split with everyone, the entree portions are huge, and of course you have to get cheesecake. I was so excited for ours-- White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle....

It was gone 60 seconds later. Literally. I'm not even joking.

We were all stuffed by the end and could barely walk out, but we had a blast.

Brody broke our promise to not spend more than $5 on presents and bought me DDR (a game for the xbox. It WAS on sale though for a really good price, so that makes it ok) AND surprised me with a flower.

(but we didn't have a vase, so he improvised)

He gave me the present early, so I figured I better come up with something good for him without spending much, so I decided to "heart attack" his side of the room. It's not a super great present, but I thought it turned out pretty good and he was very surprised when he woke up to this this morning.

After church, we just spent the day together preparing dinner, going on a walk, playing cards and baking cookies. (I finally made a successful batch of cookies! I think my mom would approve)

Then later on that night our friends came over for dessert and we played the game "like minds." I thought the game was pretty fitting and we had a good time!

I think it's kind of fun to have a holiday to celebrate and spend time with the ones you love.

Greatest. Invention. Ever.

I like to take a lot of pictures of random life activities. When it comes to things that Brody and I do by ourselves, I usually just have to take a picture of one of us alone (that's no fun) or stretch my arm out with the camera in it and try to fit both of us and whatever is in the background (which never happens. i'm not very good at centering and one of our faces usually gets cut in half), or find a flat surface to put the camera on and use the timer (it's pretty difficult to find a surface that is just right).

Well, while my mom was here, she brought a little surprise for me. It also happens to be the greatest invention I have ever seen--

A mini camera tripod that can be used almost anywhere. For example:

- In a tree

- On the back of a chair, or on a bar or railing of any sort

- Or on a very uneven surface

- And best of all, it fits right in my purse so I can have it at all times!

It's perfect. I love this new accessory of mine and I'm sure it will get used a LOT.

Officially AZ residents

We are now officially AZ residents. In my book anyway. To everyone else, we were probably official when we filled out a change of address form. But to me, it's not REALLY set in stone until you switch license plates. Originally, we were going to get the car re-registered in Utah when we were home for Christmas and keep our beloved Utah plates for as long as possible.... but then we found out a few things that changed our mind:

--(A) in AZ you don't have to get your car inspected (only an emissions test) VS an inspection every year in UT and then paying whatever it costs to fix any problems

--(B) A car registration in AZ only costs $50 and it lasts for TWO years VS $120 to register a car in UT that only lasts 1 year.

So.... we saved about $200 to register the car in AZ. Sounds worth it to me.

We waited until the very last day in January (the month our old stickers expired) and then said goodbye. It was a sad occasion. I almost cried....... (not really though). And really, I'm only this sad because we will NEVER have Ski Utah! plates on our car ever again, seeing as how someone thought they were ugly and replaced them with a weird Idaho-looking one. (no offense Idaho people) Oh well, life goes on! Plus, we'll only be here for another year and a half and then who knows what kind of license plate will then be displayed on our vehicle.

Mom's here!!

We had an awesome fun-filled weekend with my mom in town! She stayed with her sister (my aunt Annie) down in Mesa and since she has 2 extra bedrooms, we stayed there too! The weekend was packed with back to back activities such as the following:

A night hike and dinner around a fire with Annie and Trace.

The moon was HUGE and so gorgeous, but of course it doesn't look as good on camera. As soon as it came over the hill, a pack a coyotes started howling. And they were close! I was a little scared.

Saturday we (along with my uncle Paul) did an 18 mile bike ride to Saguaro Lake. We had lunch at a cute restaurant there, out on the patio. The lake and its surrounding scenery was so pretty!

We played a quick game of shuffleboard with grammy. Mom and grandma came out on top at the last second!

We ate. Lots. Which is always good.

And we played lots of fun games, and me, Annie and mom created a cute Valentines craft and made yummy cookies! (I REALLY need to learn how to make my mom's cookies. They are probably my most favorite things on the planet-- as far as dessert goes.) We sat in the hot tub one night and Trace came up with a really fun Wal-Mart scavenger hunt for the next night. Brody and I won by one point!

We also had a great time visiting and hanging out with the many friends and relatives that live in Mesa. It was so fun to have my mom down here for the weekend. I love it when we can spend time together and for the fun times we have. I think it's so great that my mom is not only a parent, but a friend. Thanks for everything you do for me. I love you!

3 weeks

We've been back in AZ for 3 weeks now and for 3 weeks Brody has been bored out of his mind! (since school doesn't start till tomorrow) So I thought we'd try and do some exciting activities while he had the extra free time. Even though I was back to working full time the day after we got home, Brody has had plenty of free time to do all our 'usuals' (laundry, cleaning, errands etc.) so that our nights and weekend were completely free! We made a list of all the things we wanted to try and do before he got his life back and we were only able to do a few of them but it was still a lot of fun! Here are a few of the highlights:

Rock Climbing

We finally got to go rock climbing together! One Saturday we headed up to 'Look Out Mountain'-- (probably named after the fact that you can 'look out' and see Phoenix!)

We climbed on the right side of this little bump, or 'mountain' as they call it here.

It was so fun to just be outside and enjoy the very different nature that exists here in Arizona.

Night Hike

One night we went on a little night hike with some friends of ours (to the same 'mountain'- it took us 20 minutes to get to the highest peak). These are friends we knew back in Logan that are now living just 15 minutes away from us! What are the odds? It was a really nice night and the lights were so pretty! Conveniently, there was a post sticking out of the ground that was the exact height and distance away to set my camera on to do the timer. weird.... but works for me!

Hot tubbing

Our apartment has a hot tub. Let me re-emphasize. a HOT tub. I think it's 1 degree less than boiling. Seriously, if I get in too fast, I feel like my skin is going to burn. After a while though, it's awesome and very relaxing. And it drains EVERYTHING out of me. We can only go at the very last second of our day because about 20 minutes after getting out, my eyes automatically shut and there is nothing I can do about it.

(This night, it was in between rain storms so it was windy and the sky was covered in a thick layer of clouds that were an orange color from all the city lights. It was so pretty but the colors didn't turn out when I tried to take a picture)

Our last big adventure was going to be camping, until the Phoenix area got more rain in 3 nights than all of last year combined (!!!!) So camping will have to wait.

(looking out our window the day after the big storm. so pretty!)

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Now it's on to almost two full weeks of visitors! (my mom comes next weekend and Linny and her girls the week after. They will be staying in Mesa but hopefully we'll be able to see a lot of them). I'm so excited!!!

After that, it's time to start thinking about getting ready for Prague!!!! We are going to be moving out and putting our stuff in storage, so that will keep us busy. For now, we love life and are excited for our adventures to come!

Late and Unexpected

Two events have happened recently that are a little late and definitely unexpected, but still made me very happy.

(disclaimer: I'm making this sound more exciting than it really is...)

Event #1: Fall in January

I didn't think I would have the pleasure this year, being in AZ and all, of experiencing the fall season as I am used to. However, for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, I feel like it is autumn outside. The window directly in front of me at work displays this:

A tree with half yellow leaves and half bare branches with a scattered pile of fallen leaves on the ground surrounding the tree. That sounds like fall to me! And sometimes, when I look out the window at the tree, there are leaves floating down to the ground. I love it! I didn't expect fall to come in January, but I'm very glad that it did. (I still miss snow, though).

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Event #2: Christmas lights.

We attempted to go down to Mesa before leaving for Utah to see the temple lights. We decided not to go one night thinking, we'll just go see the lights at the Salt Lake temple while we're home. Do you think that happened? No. We were much too busy having fun in Logan! So I was just going to settle for the fact that I just wouldn't be able to see a big display of Christmas lights this year. Then, one night about a week after being back in AZ, as me and Brody were driving around, we happened upon this:

Also known as "Glendale Glitters." Apparently Glendale really gets into the Christmas spirit-- enough to leave these lights up and turned on well past the new year. Lucky for me however, this meant that I was able to enjoy the beauty of Christmas lights when I didn't think I'd be able to, even if it was a little late.