Reunion

I got to get together with 3 of my girlfriends from high school for lunch one afternoon. It was so fun to see them and get all caught up on what is going on with them. I wish I would have had more time to spend visiting with friends, but it was great to see these girls, even if it was just for a couple of hours :)

Christmas Day

On Christmas Day we got up and had THE breakfast, made by Pops of course. Boy have I missed that :) We also got to video chat with the Blad's in Abu Dhabi (thank you Skype!). We opened our sibling gifts while we were video chatting with Lori and Jeremy. Then we opened the rest of our family gifts. Charles and I then got to talk to Stuart who is in Spain right now serving a mission. It was good to hear from him and that he is doing well. Later in the day we went to Nana and Papa's and had a delicious lunch there followed by more gift giving. What a blessing family is.

Cookie Monster

I think that just about every time Logan came over to Mimi and Pop's house, he had to make Christmas cookies. I don't know if this is always a tradition when he comes over, or if he was just in the holiday baking mood- but it was pretty funny. This boy is so cute and so fun! He knows how to decorate some cookies too :)

New Year's Joy List

So everybody talks and thinks about New Year's resolutions around this time of year, which is a good thing and should happen, but I got to thinking how often that causes us to reflect on the negative sides of the year. So before Heather and I set some goals we decided to make a list of the things that brought us joy in 2008.

Here's our list. What's on your list?

1. Giving birth to our first child Abigail. Becoming parents has brought more meaning to our lives and more joy than we could have ever imagined. For those of you who are parents I'm sure you understand. For those of you who are soon to become parents, the best is still to come.

2. Our first home. We cannot thank Dad and Mom Himmer enough for all the sacrifice and help they have provided so we have a beautiful home in a nice quite neighborhood to raise our family. We absolutely LOVE our home and couldn't have asked for a better setup.

3. Graduating College.

4. Family coming for Abigail's birth and blessing.

5. Visiting family for Christmas.

6. Sunday dinner with Himmers.

7. Family First Christmas Performance.

8. Heather and Abigail getting to go to Andria's wedding.

9. Andrew coming home.

10. Stuart leaving (for a missions its worth it although we are missing him).

p.s. List is not in order of importance although Abigail's birth would be number 1 if it was.

HENRY

Kyle and Alissa came down for Christmas too. Their little boy is getting so big! He is almost ONE now. Whenever he got close to Abigail, he would hold her hand. It was so sweet. We had their car seats next to each other a couple of times and he would just reach over and hold her hand while we drove.

Meeting some Family

Abigail got to meet my dad, "Pops" for the first time

Cousin Logan


Aunt Becca


This was how Logan let us know he was done holding Abigail. haha... he would just kind of slide out from underneath her

Pre-Christmas with the Himmers

Before we left for Texas, we got to have our Christmas with our family here. We had a lot of fun and glad that we got to celebrate a little early here before we left. Abigail got some fun books, the Christmas PJ's she's sporting, and some fun toys. Along with our PJ's Charles and I got tickets to see the Broadway "Lion King" in February when they come to Seattle. I can't wait!! I love my musicals :)

Abigail opening her presents

Going after Grandpa


Does she look interested in those presents or what?

We're Back

We have spent the last two weeks in Texas visiting my family for Christmas. It was a lot of fun and so good to have ALMOST everyone together. Lori and her family were far away and we missed them. I have a TON of pictures from our trip, so I will be doing scattered posts for a while. Abigail got to meet lots of her family for the first time, and got to see a few familiar faces that came out when she was born or blessed. We had a blast and Abigail was so good the whole time. Abigail liked Texas a lot, we can't wait to go back this summer. So there is the quick update- we are back, had a fun new years day, and today we are back in the swing of things- ready or not. Hope you all had a Merry Christmas!

Let it Snow :)

you know... snow is actually kind of fun when you can just step out for a second and enjoy it, then come back inside and get warm. I had come to despise that white powder when I had to walk to school in it every day. But here, it doesn't happen often, and when it does, everything is canceled. In fact, last night, it got me off the hook for at the stake Christmas fireside with Sam, which I just so happened to be terrified about singing :) Thank you snow, see you again soon!

Rice, Rice, Baby...

We had our first successful rice cereal meal yesterday. We'd tried once about 2 weeks ago, but she wasn't really feeling it. I decided it was time to try again yesterday because Abigail was really interested in our food. When she saw our breakfast, she started making chewing motions with her mouth. She tried chewing the rice cereal too. It was really cute. She's growing too fast, but I can't complain, she's just getting cuter by the day.