Winter and Holiday Happenings

We had a great...very busy...holiday season!  We went to Oregon again this year to spend Christmas with my family.  My parents are moving out here in April, so they had sold their home last spring.  This Christmas we were all in their rental, which was 2 bedroom/2 bath and about 1000 sq. ft.  So we had 6 adults and 4 boys (3 and under) in this little space!  We survived and had a great time playing and visiting family.  My parents ended up sleeping at their old neighbors house, Blake slept in the master bath, Landon on the master floor, Jared and I in the Master bed, my 2 month old nephew slept in the laundry room, my 2 year old nephew on the guest room floor and my brother and SIL in the guest bed!  We definitely made some good memories and all still love each other!

Before Christmas I took the boys to see Santa!

We aren't fully doing Santa with the boys but Landon was pretty into it this year. We told him it would be like getting a picture taken with Mickey Mouse if you went to DisneyLand, that he's not real...I think he does believe he's real though :)

These pictures were AMAZING!

The place we went had a Santa's workshop set up and we went during the day so there was no wait.  We were the only ones there and Santa spent about 10 minutes with us and read the boys a book.

It was so sweet and such a great experience!

I know Blake looks less than thrilled, but 30 seconds before and 30 seconds after this picture he was all smiles and even gave Santa a high five!

(he is a MAJOR momma's boy and freaks out like this if I even walk out of the room!)

Jared and I celebrated our 10th Anniversary on the 6th (woohoo)!

We had a fun night out of shopping for new master bedding, dinner and a movie!

Vegas was kind of our BIG trip, so our anniversary was much more low key!

Landon had a Christmas program at his preschool and he was soooo cute!

Although he may have been the kid who picked his nose through a majority of the program!!!

Jared and I also went to his annual Christmas party for work...it's always fun to dress up and have a night out!

The boys did great on both flights and were real troopers getting up at 4:15 AM to catch our 6 AM flight (they were both a little stir crazy by the time the flights ended though)!

We go to spend a lot of time with my grandparents!

 

Which always make me happy!

I love getting pics of the boys with them!

Even though we are far away they are talked about often!

One of the highlights of the trip was getting to hold my new nephew!  

He was born Halloween and is sooooo precious.  I could have held him all day!

He was such a good baby and just went with the flow!

Hopefully, he knows how much Auntie loves him!

Our boys got slightly spoiled again!  They ended up having 3 Christmases!  One with Jared's family before we left, the one with my family in Oregon and one with Jared and I when we got home!

They were all so much fun though :)

After we got back we went to our good friend's house and made gingerbread men!

These 4 kids are the cutest and will hopefully all be best friends growing up!

We also got a big snow storm, so it was fun to take the boys out and play!

Landon has been begging to build a snowman.  I attempted to make one on a day Jared was working. It turned out rather pathetic, but Landon was thrilled with it anyway!

I think that pretty much sums up our December and January!

Such a fun time of year full of love, family, chaos and most of all God's grace and love!

I guess I should also mention that there was a little naughtiness by Landon this last week.  He was "helping" me spray paint a picture frame outside when it go really windy so we had to come in.  I ran into the bedroom to put my shoes away and he got ahold of the spray paint can.  I came out to him spray painting the floor!  I was stunned and screamed because it surprised me so much!  After investigating more I realized in a span of about 2-3 minutes he had spray painted the wall, floor, chair, table, window, blinds and curtains!  Thankfully, I didn't really freak out because I was able to get it all off with steel wool, dish soap and hot water!  No punishment was dished out this time, but if it ever happens again he won't be so lucky :)

Vegas Baby!

This vacation really starts clear back in June, since that is when is Annie called me and asked if we wanted to go to a Justin Timberlake concert with them in Vegas in November!  Admittedly we aren't huge JT fans, but we don't do many vacations and we really don't do vacations sans kids...so we decided to go for it and the planning began!

We booked flights, hotel rooms and most importantly JT concert tickets!

We were excited to travel without kids...it's been 4 years since the last time I flew without at least one kiddo!

Most pictures are of Jared and I and then Annie and Justin...here we are on the way to our hotel in the shuttle (I was a little excited to be on vacation)!

We stayed at the Vdara and had views of the Bellagio fountain.  

The room was so nice and the perfect getaway location!

We actually left on Thanksgiving night, which seemed a little odd but both our kids were with grandparents and very well taken care of!

Thanksgiving night we had planned on doing a buffet at the Bellagio, but when getting to the restaurant there was a 3 hour wait!!!!  We were shocked that anyone would actually wait that long for a buffet (there was a serious line), so we ended up at a Mexican restaurant at Aria.  It was SO good!  The chips and salsa were amazing, our food was amazing and the margaritas were amazing! I must say that Vegas is expensive though...each drink was anywhere from $15-$18!  Needless to say alcohol wasn't a huge part of our weekend, but it was fun to get an occasional drink and enjoy each others company!

We were walking through the Aria and a guy told us we could get into the club (The Haze) for free, so we decided to go and dance for a bit.  We were all glad that we didn't actually pay to get in (it is usually $20-$40 per person), it was fun but we didn't stay longer than about an hour or so.  

I should mention that right after dinner Annie and I decided to put a dollar into some penny type slots and see what happened...well I turned my dollar into $28!  I then put another dollar in and ended up walking away with $69!  Seriously...it was so crazy!  We all tried to play the same game again over the weekend and no one else won :(

On Friday we had an amazing breakfast across from the Bellagio fountains and then did some sightseeing and relaxing.  We went to dinner at a fun Italian restaurant before the concert, rocked out to JT and then went to bed!  We were not the all night party animals, it was so nice to get 3 nights of uninterrupted sleep and to not get woken up in the morning!

Annie and I were were a little pumped for the concert!

It makes it so much more fun if you are jazzed, so I decided to take pre-concert pics to show everyone's emotion prior to JT!

I think Annie and I won the excitement award :)

Who wouldn't be pumped for JT?!?!?

Our husbands were great sports though and danced through the night with us!

I'm so glad I got to share the experience with Jared!

Somewhere along the way we all thought Jay Z was opening for him and we were excited about that...unfortunately that wasn't the case but JT put on a great concert and he is a true entertainer. 

 

He didn't have an opening performer and the concert was still 3 hours long with just him.

His set was amazing and along the way it actually moved and he came out to the middle of the arena and performed for quite awhile.

He danced, 

sang, 

played the piano,

 

played the guitar

 

and really performed for us!

It would have been more fun if I knew more of the songs because the last two songs were ones we knew and it was WAY more fun to sing along!

I'm sure JT was pooped at the end of the night because we definitely were!

Saturday we spent sightseeing, riding the New York New York roller coaster, eating some more and walking around the Wynn, Palazzo, and The Venetian. 

This was the Cosmopolatian hotel...sooo pretty!

The Wynn had an amazing area where you can get drinks outside in front of a waterfall, at night the trees light up and there are different colored light shows...it was beautiful and one of the best nights!

We ended the night watching the Bellagio fountain for about an hour and then ended the night early again!  We were going to go to another show but it was so expensive that we decided against it.

We had such a great time and it was so fun being with Justin and Annie.  They are great travel friends who are relaxed, easy going, and up for anything (or nothing at all).  We laughed a ton, had great conversation and are excited for our next trip together!

I'm sooooo thankful for the time I got to spend with Jared.  It was much needed and much appreciated.  It is rare (like years and years) rare when we get that much time alone together!

And here's a video of JT himself rocking it out and serenading us at his concert!