January

I slacked all of January in just about everything. I'm blaming it on the cold weather and seemingly endless days of cloudy skies. With Keith putting in longer days at school, no money, and no vehicle to drive 50% of the time, this little girl is the only thing keeping me sane:
Despite the fact that she is now recovering from her 3rd ear infection in 2 months, she is still full of life and energy and is growing up way too fast.

For All You Milk Lovers

This coupons too good not to share
Go to:
http://promotions.whymilk.com/ggg/
and enter to win milk for a year, then print off a coupon (you can print 2) for a free 1/2 gallon of chocolate milk when you purchase 1 gallon of white milk- any brand

Christmas in Utah: click to enlarge

2nd Anniversary

Christmas in Idaho

Christmas Vacation

We first flew into Salt Lake on Saturday and stayed until Monday to spend the week with my family in Idaho Falls. Because my brothers were still in school and my dad was working, the week was one of lazy relaxation. I'll keep it brief:
Highlights from Idaho
* Enjoying a warmer Idaho winter but disappointed it didn't snow so we could go snowmobiling
* Guitar and choir performances by the men in my family
* Spending the weekend with the Beckers
* Seeing John, Meagan and Kaylee
* Visiting Rexburg again and seeing the lights at night and being able to do a session at the Rexburg Temple
* Not so fun- having a cyst rupture on our anniversary. How great that we know and love Dr. Lovell who took me in and took care of me by checking everything out and giving me a shot of relief.
*Being able to watch cable

We spent the week of Christmas with Keith's family in Utah. Everyone was able to take time off of work and we had many late nights playing games and taking advantage of so many willing babysitters.
Highlights from Utah:
* Mormon Tabernacle Christmas performance with Natalie Cole. I wanted to go SO bad and was really excited Brandon's neighbor gave up tickets so we could go
* Late b-day celebration with Cold Stone Ice Cream Cake. Thanks Shaws!
* Cousin Stephen's Homecoming and being able to see the Wold family.
* Stopping by Grandma Anderson's to say hi and see Nycole and Scott on their way to Idaho. 95% of my wardrobe now consists of clothing given to me by Nycole whom Keith says has great taste in clothes.
* Celebrating our 2nd anniversary in Midway in our same honeymoon suite. Our first night away from Mackenzie- it was fabulous!
* Seeing Jon, Kaity, and Halle who hooked Mackenzie up with some pretty cute clothes!
* Taking a carriage ride with all the Shaws through Thanksgiving Point to see the lights
* Joy creating Kenzie's first pigtail
* Day trip to the Discovery Museum at the Gateway. Thanks Randy for the free passes!
* Christmas Eve talent performance in which I did not perform but enjoyed performances by Katie on the flute, Keith on the sax and piano, Brandon on the Banjo, Keith's parents on the piano and Rebecca, Joy and Kirk's vocals.
* Unfortunately Mackenzie did not sleep well in Utah so she ended up in bed with us almost every night. As much as we loved the cuddling, we didn't love her tossing and turning.
* Frustrating Keith's parents with our love for Russian Rummy
* Seeing "The Blind Side" we highly recommend it!

I'm sure I'm forgetting a few things. We had a great time and are very grateful for generous parents and loving family. To those of you we weren't able to see in Utah- We're so sorry!! We were so busy and wished we had just one more day to stop by and see everyone. Next year, we'll plan a little better.

Oh Christmas Tree

We were at Lowe's the Saturday after Thanksgiving and saw that their garden section was full of Christmas trees. Loving all things Christmas, I convinced Keith to come check them out with me. I became hopelessly nostalgic remembering past Christmas's picking out trees with my family and then basking in the smell of the woody pine that would fill the house for weeks. After seeing how decently priced the trees were ($15 for a 6') I begged and pleaded with Keith for one until he succumbed (I can be annoyingly persuasive if I want to be). They wrapped it up and we packed it into the trunk of the Impala- I knew that car was good for something. And here it is in all it's glory. It's been a few years since I've been in a house with a real tree and I'm convinced I can't go back to fake for a few more years. Mackenzie's been pretty good about leaving it alone. It helps that we ran out of lights and so the bottom third of the tree is not yet decorated.
Kenz turned 13 months on Thursday. We celebrated my birthday and her thirteen month milestone by going to the pediatrician. Poor little girl still has her ear infections. It's hard to tell with her because she doesn't run a very high fever and she still has all the energy in the world . She just tends to get a little more clingy when all is not well:

She perked up a bit after her first dose of the new antibiotics and a nap and was an angel at Costco and at my friend Christina's house. That night, we met up with Keith for dinner at Red Robin where the Robin stopped by to visit our table and paralyzed Kenzie with fear for a good 10 minutes. Later, we watched
"The Santa Clause" and she climbed up on the couch and laid her head in our laps, she was so miserable. She seems to be doing a little better now and hopefully she'll be good as new when we fly out in a week!

I thought I would include this little video. It's a couple weeks old but it shows the gorilla crawl she was constantly doing between her walking. It's so fun to just watch her toddle around now. She seems so old to me. Notice the bow popping out with the balls. She stuffs everything from wooden spoons to tampons in that thing. Which reminds me, how do you style a baby's hair who rips out everything you put in it?