Monday, November 21, 2011

Thankful for... my husband.

Bryce passed with flying colors! :) The executives said that he surpassed their expectations by a long shot. He was feeling pretty good. I knew he would. He is amazing. Not to mention a super hard worker. In light of the season... I am so grateful for such a dedicated and loving husband. He supports me in everything and works hard at his job to provide for our little family. He is wonderful and I am so glad I get to share my forever with him! Love you sweetheart! <3 I'm so proud of you!





Friday, November 18, 2011

Mini Houdini

Today is the day!!! This final interview should be over and passed! Bryce is focusing hard on memorizing everything... with the health care market the way it is... its a lot to memorize. We're praying hard that he will remember it all when the executives quiz him on his knowledge. I know he will blow them out of the water! But a little divine help is always appreciated! :)

Brayden wanted to tell his story... so here he is:

mmmaaaammmmm. bblloobbb *raspberry* oooo-oooo.

Roughly translated that means...

Mom's old friend came to visit and she brought me a new pal. Sterling is 2 months younger than me, but about my same size. Mom and her friends decided to go out to the mall for a girl's night. Since Dad had to study I got to tag along. We were all starving by the time we got there, so we went straight to the food court where mom put me into the stroller. I enjoyed the crackers and cookie I got waiting for the opportune moment. Then, just as I had given up hope of escape my moment had come! Mom turned to look at the baby for a minute, this was my chance! I wiggled down beneath the lap bar, turned sideways and let gravity pull my feet to the floor. Ica had to go and see me as I was squatting to my knees. Never mind her, I'm a fast crawler now I can get away!  I don't know how she did it, but she caught me before my escape was complete. Maybe next time...

Again, that was a rough translation. He might be guest posting again sometime. We'll see. But I will say this, we couldn't help but laugh at the amazing-ness of the whole food court ordeal! He couldn't help but look quite pleased with himself either. lol.

Brayden is crawling for real now... on his hands and knees. It's taken him about a month to figure out that it is faster. We think he still has a harder time on the hard floor, but he's getting the hang of it quickly. I have begun locking our cupboards, and am on to drawers here soon. He also pulls himself up on basically everything, so everything is rising in elevation. Any suggestions on bookshelves?

I have this little tradition for Thanksgiving. I make the table centerpieces for the celebrations. It started when I was in my floral arranging class and I wanted to try my hand at it. This year I was watching my daily dose of Studio 5 when one of my favorite contributors talked about this project. I knew that I would have to try them for the centerpieces. Here they are so far! I'm quite excited about them...


I have been busily working on gifts for the birthdays that are coming up. My mother-in-law had a birthday on November 9, and My mom has one coming up in December. I can't wait to post about the projects I've been working on for them... but I can't give away the surprise. I just want everyone else to be excited too. :)


Thanks to everyone who actually reads my random updates... It means a lot. Lots of Love! XOXO



Sunday, November 6, 2011

October update

Yep, another month has come and gone and I have one post to claim... I thought I'd update  ya'll and give you another little peek into our humble lives.

Life is busy but we are enjoying our time with our little guy and together.  We tried our hand at canning... Grandma and Grandpa Grass had us over to teach us the ropes and let us use their canner. 11 bottles... pretty tasty. Not too shabby for our first time! :)


We are loving our family history calling in our ward and are learning all sorts of things about the resources available to us. We are teaching a 6 week course during Sunday school where we have a few couples in the ward come into the family history center and we all work on family histories. I've found that an easy way to get into it all is just to go look through the FamilySearch site. But I took a look at the site for the youth that Elder Bednar talked about in General Conference. It is a great resource! Its not as overwhelming as I thought! We are also preparing to take a field trip to the family history library in Salt Lake with some ward members to participate in their youth scavenger hunt. It sounds like a lot of educational fun! I'm just a little bit excited! :)

October has been busy for us. I spent much of the month preparing for our Halloween Bash and our first annual Witch's tea party. I enjoy planning parties, so it has been a lot of fun. This is the big party of the year for me as we have not been established long enough to get into the other holidays. ;) I have also spent some time working on some Halloween decorations to set the mood around the living room. (for more detail, I wrote a post here, here, and here.) The rest of the time I get to play with Brayden who is growing so quickly I can hardly believe it!

Brayden turned 8 months yesterday. He knows how to crawl (though his stomach is is preferred transportation) and he is determined to stand on anything that is sturdy (and sometimes not) to hold his weight. He wants to walk really bad, but is still too wobbly to make it very far. He is a happy little boy and even teething hasn't been too terrible. ( I know, I am so blessed!) He has a third tooth next to his other bottom two that came in last week. He likes real food too. He will usually give me a little face for the first bite of a new food but then he seems to like whatever I choose to give him. Other than that, he'll eat anything he finds... including Max's cat food... twice... but to his defence they do look like his snacks...  He's adventurous and excited to find something he's not supposed to have.

Bryce is working hard studying for his final interview with the executives at his job. He comes home everyday and tells me something new he is learning about the health care industry. There is a LOT to know about the health care industry! He is scheduled to do his interview on the 17th of November. Keep him in your thoughts and prayers! He's going to need some divine assistance, but I know he is capable of passing this thing! Go get 'em sweetheart! :)

Someday I'll figure out how to post a few little videos of Brayden. But for now you just get some more pictures. ;) Thanks for reading! Love you all!



Abby makes a great babysitter. If only she lived closer... so cute! 

Thanks to John and Dana for the awesome saucer. He loves it! 






Yep, cute. :)

This was our first trip out to see the pretty leaves.

XOXO



Monday, October 31, 2011

Halloween 2011: Monster Bash + Mash-tini Bar

This year's Halloween Bash was the most successful party I have thrown yet. I am so pleased with the turn out. Thanks to all who came and made it the success it was! It was fun to see everyone who came and their costumes. (This is a looong post... just warning ya!)



We had a "Monster Mash-tinis" complete with the "spare parts" bar. Guests were served martini glasses filled with mashed potatoes. Everyone was then able to put whatever toppings they wanted on them and eat them out of the glasses. (hence, the spare parts...)



The spread also included a few... "Dreadful Edibles" including "Purina Wolf Chow" (Chex muddy buddies with candy corn and peanuts), Fruit "ninja bites" (delicious fruit pizzas), a jello heart, and my mom's panna cotta brain.



Jell-o heart






Ninja bites



As this was originally a cocktial/mock tail party, we had a few drinks. There was pumpkin poison (which was actually a recipe for Butterbeer I found on the Internet), "sweetened swamp water" (hot chocolate), and "bug juice". The bug juice turned out to be my favorite... did you know that if you put a raisin (or in our case, raspberry crasins) into a carbonated beverage it will rise to the top and sink to the bottom? It was way fun to watch! I used the Berry 7-up that was purple and plopped them in. The picture doesn't capture it all the way... but we took video of it too! :)








We also had our traditional pumpkin bowling lane set up in the carport, but this year we decided to hold a graham cracker haunted house contest! Entry into the contest was a bag of a candy you could use to decorate with. We provided the graham crackers and the royal icing. (I found this awesome tutorial on the icing here.)





Tip: glow sticks in the water bottles made them easier to see.







can you guess who's house this one is? :)

After everyone had built their houses and voted on favorite house, and the three costume categories (Creepiest, Cutest, &amp; Most Creative). We started the Ghostbuster movie and held an award ceremony for the winners. The party ended with the movie and the after party began (that is when the clean up happens so we don't have a pile of dishes for the next week and a half.)

we won the office "best family theme" prize at Superman's work. just FYI.

I had so much fun this year and am already planning next year's bash! I have some crazy ideas and possibly an awesome new venue! So excited! :) Thanks for reading!

xoxo

one more, just because it makes me smile... :)

Halloween Monster Bash!



This year's Halloween Bash was the most successful party I have thrown yet. I am so pleased with the turn out. Thanks to all who came and made it the success it was! It was fun to see everyone who came and their costumes. (This is a looong post... just warning ya!)


We had a "Monster Mash-tinis" complete with the "spare parts" bar. Guests were served martini glasses filled with mashed potatoes. Everyone was then able to put whatever toppings they wanted on them and eat them out of the glasses. (hence, the spare parts...)



The spread also included a few... "Dreadful Edibles" including "Purina Wolf Chow" (Chex muddy buddies with candy corn and peanuts), Fruit "ninja bites" (Ica's delicious fruit pizzas), a jello heart, and my mom's panna cotta brain.



Jell-o heart






Ninja bites



As this was originally a cocktial/mock tail party, we had a few drinks. There was pumpkin poison (which was actually a recipe for Butterbeer I found on the Internet), "sweetened swamp water" (hot chocolate), and "bug juice". The bug juice turned out to be my favorite... did you know that if you put a raisin (or in our case, raspberry crasins) into a carbonated beverage it will rise to the top and sink to the bottom? It was way fun to watch! I used the Berry 7-up that was purple and plopped them in. The picture doesn't capture it all the way... but we took video of it too! :)








We also had our traditional pumpkin bowling lane set up in the carport, but this year we decided to hold a graham cracker haunted house contest! Entry into the contest was a bag of a candy you could use to decorate with. We provided the graham crackers and the royal icing. (I found this awesome tutorial on the icing here.)





Tip: glow sticks in the water bottles made them easier to see.







can you guess who's house this one is? :)

After everyone had built their houses and voted on favorite house, and the three costume categories (Creepiest, Cutest, & Most Creative). We started the Ghostbuster movie and held an award ceremony for the winners. The party ended with the movie and the after party began (that is when the clean up happens so we don't have a pile of dishes for the next week and a half.)

we won the office "best family theme" prize at Bryce's work. just FYI.

I had so much fun this year and am already planning next year's bash! I have some crazy ideas and possibly an awesome new venue! So excited! :) Thanks for reading!

xoxo

one more, just because it makes me smile... :)