Thanksgiving and Family Pictures...

It was a wonderful Thanksgiving!! We were so blessed to have all of our family members home at the same time. We had a crazy, whirlwind week that just didn't seem long enough. Chelsea was here for four days - and we enjoyed her so much! We ate (of course), watched movies, visited grandparents and friends, took family pictures, had many deep conversations into the wee hours of the morning and had lots of good laughs! My girls don't get to see their aunt Chelsea enough...but they just ate her up!! They get pretty attached to people and it made me sad when they woke up the morning Chelsea left and they were searching the house for her. "Where Chelsea go??" Heartbreaking...especially when it is unknown how soon they may get to see her again. They had fun playing with BrookLynn and Elle, of course. Their little eyes would light up whenever it was time to go see them. Pure excitement! It made my heart happy.

We were so lucky to have my family invited over to Leithead's for Thanksgiving dinner. It was so nice to only have to eat one meal and not have to race back and forth between families all day. Thank you Marla!!! Dinner was delicious...and as usual, we ate too much. In fact I am still eating too much!

As you can see in our family pics, Kacee made my hair beautiful again. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!! Matty even got a trim...and Anastyn got her very first hair cut!! She was so excited. She went around for the next two days pointing to her hair and saying "hair!". Pretty cute. Kyle even got a hair cut (unwillingly)...but since it was after family pics you can't see...he has much shorter hair now. (Thank you, babe!! Love it!)

And, as I could have predicted, Kristin and I were only able to get one of our planned projects done. There is never enough time!! We completed the tu-tu's for the girls. That's it. Heaven knows how we are supposed to get 12 months worth of calendar pages for each of our mothers done in...lets see....24 days (we have done that before...but that was when we lived in the same town!!) I think we will have to enroll our moms in the "calendar page-of-the-month club" and just get one to them before its time to flip to the next month! Ha ha!!!

Now December has officially begun and I am in the middle of a Christmas decoration train wreck!! I did get the tree finished today...well, sort of. I usually put a whole bunch of ribbon on the tree, but I searched through all of my totes and boxes...no ribbon. I vaguely remember getting frustrated while removing the ribbon last year and throwing it all away! I must have been mad! Do you know how expensive ribbon is? So...the tree is finished...minus the ribbon.

Oh...and my Willow Tree Nativity (one of my most prized posessions)...well, when I started taking the figurines out of their boxes, I was sickened to find that three of them were broken. I wanted to cry! So I had to get the glue out last night and try to mend them. I hate moving...it is always your favorite things that get broken.

And then....grrrrrrr....ALL of my Christmas candles were melted!! Yeah...last January after I took all the Christmas stuff down, Kyle decided to put some of the totes up in the attic, which seemed like a good enough idea. We just didn't think it through to August in St. George, Utah. Uh-huh...candles don't keep their shape in 110 degree weather.

Anyways...its all good. Hopefully I can finish decorating tonight so that it doesn't look like a bomb went off in the living room anymore. And then I can start making a list of all the other things that need to be done by December 25th...oh boy...it's going to be a long list!!

Hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving. I know that I have a lot to be thankful for...and more than anything...I am thankful that I was able to spend the week with all of our loved ones!! Enjoy December...hope it is {mAgiCaL}!!

I'm So ExCiTed!!!!!

I can't wait to get through this week! Thanksgiving is coming up, so we are looking forward to LOTS of family coming into town!! I have butterflies in my stomach just thinking about it! Since we moved back to Lovell, life's pace has slowed down quite a bit. So anything different - anything at all - gets me extremely excited. Not to mention I haven't seen some of my favorite people in the world for a very long time!!!

**I really wanted to put some of those countdown widgets in my post for a couple things that I am really anxious for...but apparantly you can't do that! You can only put them on your sidebar, which I didn't really want to do. I just wanted to have them in the body of my post. So - if someone knows how to do this, please let me know!!**

So, what am I so excited about?? I have not seen my sister since she moved to L.A. in MARCH!!! We get to pick Chelsea up at the Cody Airport next Tuesday!! I just cannot wait!! We get to have her for about 4 days. We always have so much fun when we get together. We never really go anywhere or do anything in particular...we like to veg...but we ALWAYS laugh really hard. That's my favorite part!! And it will be fun for the girls to hang out with her...they don't get to see her enough.

This coming Friday, Kristin, Eli and their girls are coming up! We get to have them here for about a week. We are going to have SO MUCH fun!! We can't ever get enough of these guys. We saw eachother on a daily basis when we were in St. George...and we have been going through some rather painful withdrawals since we left. Kristin and I were like the dynamic duo together...we crafted and cooked and all kinds of fun things!! But apart, we lack inspiration. So, needless to say, we have quite a few projects lined up to do while they are here. We will be scrapping (calendars for our moms Christmas gifts), making tu-tu's for the girls, and without a doubt, whipping up some of our famous carameled apples!!! Yummmmmmmmmy!

We are also hoping to get into the long-awaited, highly anticipated Twilight Movie!! We just cannot wait! Now, if I were still in Utah, I would have gone and bought our tickets long before now just to make sure we would be able to see it opening night. But....here in Wyoming....things just don't work that way!! I went to Cody the other day to see if I could get tickets in advance....no way, no how!!! What a bummer! So, we will just have to drive all the way to Powell or Cody and hope we get in!! Ha, ha!

And there are still more reasons for me to be suffering with anticipation!!! My beautiful sister-in-law, Kacee, and her husband will be coming Monday or Tuesday. Everyone jumps for joy when Kacee comes to town because she always pampers us when she's here (she is a beautician)!! Poor girl kind of gets taken advantage of...but that's only because she does such a good job! We love her and always look forward to being made pretty again!! I am in dire need of a haircut!!

We also get to see Kari and Tyler again sometime next week. They are so much fun to have around. Kyle and Tyler love to go coyote hunting together! The girls go crazy when they get to hang out with "Kiwi and Tyla". They get showered with attention and eat it up!! We have been lucky because we were able to spend time with them two weekends in a row over the deer hunt. It was way fun...and we can't wait for them to get here from South Dakota!

So...I hope this week goes really fast, cause I'm ready for the FUN to begin!!!

Mr & Mrs Irresistable Remember Whens...

Kyle and I have been married for over 10 years now. And we dated for two or three before that. I was just thinking of some of the experiences we have had together. Some make me smile, some make me cry, and most just make me laugh!! But, anyways, I thought I would make a list of some of them...just for the fun of it. So, this is mostly for us...sorry...I guess you had to be there. :D

**Kyle knows my memory is very unreliable so some things are a little fuzzy.

Remember When...

• while on a ward temple excursion (yes, we grew up in the same ward), you asked me to "go out with you". We might have been in middle school. I told you "no". Hmmmm....so I changed my mind!




• we were in Woodshop together my Senior year. We flirted like crazy! You practically built my cedar chest for me. And remember our "friendship chips"? (for our readers: we made them out of little wood chips. Both of us had one and we wore them around our necks.) That was so cute...I believe it was your idea. (sigh)




• at track meets we would sit on a blanket and listen to Alanis Morissette together. It was romantic. And I believe it was on our way home from a track meet that we had our first kiss. The track team stopped in Laurel, MT, at a Burger King. We decided it would be funny if we both put sweet 'n' sour sauce on our lips and then kiss. We were just being silly...but deep down we both just wanted to kiss eachother!! :)




• i went deer hunting with you and somebody...was it Jade or Nick? Can't remember. We saw some deer...I told you to shoot...you did....I cried.




• we went to prom-twice-my senior year and your senior year. (yes, I am OLDER than Kyle). I think it was my senior year that we went to Billings with Wendy and her date. We ate dinner at Applebee's and I started to get a headache. You ran...on foot...clear over to Wal-Mart to buy me some Tylenol. You melted my heart right then and there, baby!




• we went to t.w.i.r.p my Senior year. We wore the goofiest outfits with x's and o's on them. I think we even sported our "friendship chips". :) We went with Carlee Graves, William Hiser, Stephanie Walker, and Trinity Opp. That was a fun night! We were elected "Mr. & Mrs. Irresistable" because we collected the most hearts from everybody at school.




• there was some kind of water leak at your house and you were sent to go get a wet vac to help clean it up. Instead of hurrying home with it, you stopped at Minchow's where I was working to visit for awhile...long enough that your mom had to come looking for you...and she was not happy!!




• you were constantly getting in trouble with your mom for hanging out with me too much. She was really good at tracking you down...even when we took measures to trick her!! Man, I'm so glad she loves me now!!!!




• I was bored at work one Sunday and was doodling "Catherine Leithead" all over some scrap paper. I threw it in the trash when I was done. I wanted to die when I came to work the next day and Jim Minchow had taped the papers up where everyone could see. How embarassing!!! I was just practicing my future name....jeez.




• we went all over Billings looking for a white gold wedding ring because I didn't want gold and we couldn't afford platinum. I think there might have been two or three in the whole city!! But we found one...which I still love to this day! You took me to a park in Billings that had a creek with a bridge over it. You proposed to me on that bridge...and it was romantic.



• we were married for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake Temple in the presence of all our loved ones. It was a wonderful day! We had a beautiful luncheon at the Joseph Smith Building. Can you even remember the luncheon? I think we were too worried about how to excuse ourselves politely so we could get on with the honeymoon!! Then when we finally made it to Logan where we were going to spend our honeymoon, we were so nervous! We put off going to the bed & breakfast by doing a little shopping first!!



• when we moved to Orem we lived in our first apartment for two days. We hadn't seen it until we actually pulled into town late at night and started unloading our belongings. I hated it. It was old and dirty and yucky. I told you I would not live there. So we found a different apartment, but it wasn't going to be available for a couple weeks. So we actually lived in the model apartment at the complex. That was interesting.



• How about the night the S.W.A.T team busted in on us at 2 a.m. pointing their big guns at us and cuffing us with zip ties...in our unmentionables!! What about how I couldn't stop laughing...cause I was afraid I would start to cry. Now that was unforgettable. (maybe we will share that story sometime for those of you that are going, "what the heck?? - what did you guys do??") Yep...we are full of surprises.



• I was so mad at you for bringing home Sunny, our chocolate lab. Funny how I fell in love with him anyways...even though he was, well, a dog. He was so much fun! Remember how heart-broken we both were when he got ran over? We miss you Sunny!!



• I didn't want you to go on that big fishing trip with your buddies about three weeks before my due date with Matalyn? Yeah...you said, "you won't go into labor while I'm gone - don't worry". Hmmmmm. You had to drive pretty fast to make it back in time for that one!! But man, I was so glad to see you when you got there!!



• we had to watch our first little baby lay in the NICU with wires and tubes hooked up to her for six days?? And taking that sweet little thing home on oxygen? Aren't we blessed that she is so healthy now. And beautiful....just beautiful!!



• Anastyn's entrance into the world was much less stressful. Everything went great...and we got to go home after only a couple days. What a pretty baby...daddy's complexion, daddy's brown eyes...how could you not fall in love with her?

I could probably go on and on...but this post has to end sometime. Thanks for the memories, babe!! Love you....

That's Gotta Hurt!!

Kyle was unfortunate enough to have an experience with a kidney stone Monday. We've all heard it said that it is comparable to labor pains. What? Really? Yes, it is. In fact, as I stood in the ER watching Kyle writhing in agony, that is exactly what I was thinking...It was horrible. He woke up suddenly about 3:30 in the morning hurting. He was going to try to wait until 8:00 when the dr.'s office opened to avoid an er visit. But about 7:00 he couldn't wait any longer! The pain was so intense and he kept throwing up...I even had to pull over on the way to the hospital to let him throw up. At the er, they took blood work and a urine sample. They gave him shots in his hiney for the nausea and pain. 4 of them. Twice for the nausea and twice for the pain. After more vomiting and worries that Kyle might actually pass out from the level of pain he was experiencing, the dr. finally arrived, reviewed the lab results and examined him. He determined it was a kidney stone and informed us that it can take 24-48 hours to pass a stone...Excuse me? How long?? This was NOT what Kyle wanted to hear! So, with a prescription for some pain killers and dr's orders to "slam a six-pack of diet coke" (which supposedly helps with passing the stone) we were able to head for home. Poor guy did finally slip into a drug induced sleep thanks to a cocktail of ibuprofin, toradol, morphine, and lortab. This was an absolute nightmare for Kyle. We all felt extremely sorry for the poor man. It was awful watching him suffer like this. Thankfully, he passed the kidney stone the following morning.


Yes...it was quite comparable to labor pains...but instead of being rewarded with a sweet new baby all he had to show for it was a tiny little pebble-shockingly small to have inflicted such excruciating pain!! He is better today...went to work and everything. But we all hope and pray we don't ever have to experience a kidney stone again....EVER.