Christmas and New Year's in Utah 2012

For a myriad of reasons, we decided to celebrate the holidays in Utah this year. We had a fantastic trip and will treasure the memories we made. Thank you to our friends and family that made this holiday season amazing! We love and miss you all already!

Here are a few of our favorite memories...in no particular order...

Staying at the Erickson's and spending time as a family

How grateful we are to have second home in Utah! We must admit, it seemed rather empty without Allison and Lauren there. We loved meeting Chandler's fiancee Matt Duvall and getting to know him - he already seems like one of the family (and he is!). Olivia loved counting her Uncle Matts: "1 Matt and 1 Matt! 2 Matts!" 

Livi in her Christmas dress from Lala.

The real Sleeping Beauty. Olivia loves her tiara from Grammy and Grandpa, she even sleeps in it! (I had actually put her tiara on the bookcase and told her she could have it after her nap. When I went in to check on her, she was wearing it!)

Matthew receives his Endowment in the Mt. Timpanogos Temple

We were so blessed to be a part of such a sacred experience. Following the temple, Mark took us all out to eat at a Chinese Buffet to honor Matt! It was awesome food and fun to be together! Olivia loved the chow mein and ice cream (and that Grandpa and Matt gave her as much as she wanted!).

We thought it was pretty nifty to be in the same temple where we were married 4 years and 1 day later! 

Visiting Grandma and Grandpa Phelps

Grandma Phelps hasn't been feeling well as of late. We loved being able to spend time with her and Grandpa during our visits to their home. We loved that during our first visit the entire Johnson clan showed up and during our second Mom, Dad and Jordan were there! I am so grateful for the sweet experiences we shared together as a family.

 City Creek Center and Temple Square

The new City Creek Center in SLC is pretty amazing. We loved the holiday lights and decor...and of course the shopping! We enjoyed a great dinner in the food court before exploring the lights at Temple Square. It was bitterly cold that night, but we loved it! 

Snow Days and Sledding

Olivia loved the snow. LOVED it. We couldn't keep her out of it, nor did we really want to considering how darling she looks in her snow clothes! She loved jumping on the snow covered trampoline and making snow angels with Daddy at Grandma and Grandpa Erickson's house, sledding with all her family at Rock Canyon Park, and making snowballs wherever there was snow! Although she's a California girl, she loves the cold and snow. 

Notice the snowball in Livi's hands?! Too funny. 

Spending time with the Johnson/Bukey/Donio Clan 

We all met up at Luinda and Jason's and enjoyed some much needed visiting, laughing, and food! We were lucky to have Michelle and Josh join us too (she hadn't been feeling very well that day, lots of Braxton Hicks). I loved seeing the little cousins play together. Olivia loved dancing with Maddy and Kaitlyn. Definitely made me wish we lived a bit closer...

Enjoying Time with the Phelps Family

Mom, Dad and Jordan made a last minute trip up to Utah to see Grandma Phelps and visit with the rest of us. We loved seeing them, even if it was for only a few short days. We ate Crepes Suzettes, looked through family photos (including Michelle and Josh's ultrasound photos of baby boy!) and watched family videos, chatted, played games, and just enjoyed being together.

Aren't these two just precious?! Livi loves her Auntie "Ya-ya".

Our true colors, don't you think?




The last photo is by far my favorite. Possessed Lisa. Haha. Gets me every time. Sure love these girls.









Seeing a few of our closest friends...
We loved celebrating Jason Summer's 30th birthday with him, Stephanie, Zane and Zoey and their family. - we couldn't get over how big the twins are! I also took an unfortunate slide down the stairs that night...resulting in a few carpet burns.
We also stopped by to see our best friend from the mission Todd Greene and his gorgeous wife Britney. We tried convincing them to move to LA. Lisa and I met up with our long time girlfriends Shani Ogden and Dani Jones at Zupas. I was reminded of how much I love them - but even more so - how much I love Shani's little girl Makadie!

Watching Tyler Haws score 42 points against Virginia Tech at the Energy Solutions Area in SLC

Grandpa gave us his basketball tickets so we (well, so I ) could watch the BYU Cougars play some serious basketball. It was a thrilling game, watching Haws almost outscore Virginia Tech single handedly! (At one point he had scored 31 points and VT 39) Thanks Grandpa for the experience! Go Cougars!!!

Celebrating our 4 year Anniversary

Wow, can it really have been 4 years together?! We have had some crazy ups and downs, but we are closer than ever and ever more grateful for the little family we've been given. We celebrated by eating some delicious Happy Sumo for dinner and walking around the Riverwoods to see all the lights. We would have stayed longer had it not been so cold!

Happy New Year!!! 2013 Here we come!

It was a pretty low key New Year's Eve for us. We went to see Les Mis as a family earlier in the day, and later that night we enjoyed games (Settlers and Crokinole), bean dip, Stars Wars Episodes 1 and part of 2, and a midnight toast with midnight kisses (well, only Chandler and I scored on that one). I was a pretty lame sister/wife (Jordan came to party with us) because I fell asleep as soon as they started the movie marathon...yeah, it was 9:30pm. Darn pregnancy! Aaron woke me up just in time for the countdown though. 

Visiting with Grammy and Grandpa

Olivia loved going to Grammy and Papa 's house. And why wouldn't she?! They had bowls of peanut M&M's on the table for her to eat! She even had her own little toy room (the closet in the tv room) and a Grandpa who loves watching movies with her. He introduced her to Bambi, I think they watched it 3 times. Grammy and Grandpa are both using canes right now, and Olivia had to have one! They adjusted an extra to be her size, she walked everywhere with it and always insisted that she and Grandpa sit on the stairs with them. I loved spending time with them both, visiting in front of the fire and tv or the Christmas tree. Their house looked beautiful all decked out for the holidays. We visited them throughout the week and on Christmas Day. I was blown away by 2 amazing gifts from them: their Christmas village and my own "Joseph frame" with leaves from the Sacred Grove and Grammy's calligraphy of the poem "Joseph"; I was quite overcome. Grandpa and I even made time for our date night at the Malt Shoppe; the fries were the best they've ever been and the company was even better! Although, might have been nice had the heater been working. 

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day

We celebrated Christmas Eve at Uncle Tom and Aunt Debbie's again this year. We enjoyed some delicious soups and breadsticks, played the "Right Left Night Before Christmas" game, and read the Christmas Story in Luke 2. We loved all being together! I fell in love with Jenny and Bryce's little Alex. We then returned home to open Christmas pajamas from Mark and set out cookies and milk for Santa! Christmas Morning was magical as it always is. Livi didn't wake up until almost 8am! Just as she was coming up the stairs, Allison called from her mission! So Christmas morning was busy with watching Livi see her gift (a dollhouse) from Santa and opening her stocking and then Skyping with Lauren and Allison. It was SO good to hear from Allie - she looks beautiful!!! Definitely one of the highlights of our trip. And watching Livi experience the magic of Christmas is definitely another one of my highlights. We didn't start opening gifts until 10:30am! Aaron surprised me with my brand new camera! A Nikon d3200. I had been looking at the Canon, but love love love my Nikon! Best surprise ever. We were so blessed with many amazing gifts - as was Livi! Although she was more interested in playing with her dollhouse and Maple than opening gifts. What a fantastic Christmas!

Christmas Morning! 

Christmas Pajamas - BYU for boys and plaid for girls!

I couldn't resist sharing this photo of Debbie. I love it! 

I love this photo! And Livi sure loves her Uncle Matt and Aunt Channy! 

Christmas Eve.

Christmas morning...man, I don't love the bags under my eyes! 

After my sweet hubby gifted me my camera. :)

Sarah's Basketball Game

We were lucky to be in town to see one of Sarah's basketball games. Aaron, Matthew, Livi and I headed over to her rivals, Orem High, to cheer her on. Sarah shot a 3 in the final minutes of the game, helping to tie the game and send them into overtime! Although Provo High did end up losing, we had a blast cheering for her. So proud of you Sarah! 

Way to go Auntie Sarah!!!

We really did have an amazing 2 1/2 weeks in Utah. It was difficult to say goodbye to everyone. By the time we're reunited with the Ericksons, Matthew will be going on his mission and Lauren will be home! By the time we're reunited with the Phelps in June, Michelle and Josh will have had their baby boy and we will have had ours, and Jordan will be graduating from high school! Lots of excited changes in the coming year, also including Chandler and Matt's wedding and Allison getting home!!!

I know we took a lot of photos, yet it was hard to capture the day to day fun activities - and we didn't always have a camera on hand for moments like going to see the Hobbit as a family, Grandma and Livi going on a date to the mall one morning to window shop, and Matt and Aaron spending quality brother gaming time - but they are experiences we will remember. Thank you again to our families (and friends) for being the reason this will be a holiday to remember! Happy New Year everyone!