better late than never!!

I know this is a late Thanksgiving post, but better late than never, right?! Thanksgiving was fabulous. Definitely an abundance of food, fun, family and friends. We spent it in Sandy with our family. As you can see, Haven loved helping Grandma Hughes make rolls. I did help with the dinner too!! I made 3 batches of stuffing even. Impressive, I know. Oh and me and my mother-in-law made the best fudge you could imagine- microwave even! I couldn't stop eating it. I couldn't stop eating everything actually. I quite possibly could have gained 10 or so pounds that day. Haven was even napping during the dinner so I got to actually eat in peace. haha doesn't happen very often.

After dinner and a wonderful nap, my sister in-laws husbands family came over and we all decorated gingerbread houses. Here is mine...Frankensnowman 'n all.

its a log cabin...but you can't really tell from the front.

love that cheesy smile Haven :)

Now the house is in our kitchen at home and every time we walk in there Haven says, "eat house" :)

Twilight

I looooooved Twilight!!! In fact I loved it so much, I saw it twice in one day. The 10:45 am and the 10:50 pm. I went with my two sister-in-laws, Stephanie and Mindy and we had so much fun. We were planning on taking the husbands for the late show but um...that didn't work out so we just went again by ourselves. And I'm glad we did because, lets be honest, our post show giddiness would have been weird for the men. hahaha.

I loved Edward and Bella. I thought they were perfect...don't care what anyone else says about it. They looked kinda just how I pictured them. And yeah there were a few cheesy lines, like the spider monkey one. whoa. hahaha but I can forgive them. Can I just say that I thought the baseball scene was awesome?! Those who know me, know how I feel about baseball in real life, but oh my vampire baseball is so cool. And did anyone catch Edward mouthing "I love you" when Bella rode away with Jasper and Alice? I didn't but Mindy did! I want to go again just so I can see that part. sigh.

It wasn't perfect but who cares, it was fun and I loved loved it. Loved the books loved the movie. Thats all I have to say.

Mal hurry and read the books so we can go see the movie again!!

I am thankful for....Scott

Happy almost Thanksgiving! I am thankful for a lot of things. But at the very top of my list is my husband. Its hard to know where to begin. He does so many things for me and our daughter. Sometimes I feel like even though I am always grateful for the many things he does for us, they don't always get acknowledged, so...

Thank you, my love, first for being mine and bringing me to the temple so that we can be together forever.

Thank you for stopping me on the stairs coming out of English 101 to ask me out :) You know after you were out of sight I called everyone I could think of to tell them the wonderful news.

Thank you for fake marrying me at Mardi Gras night back in our college days.

Thank you for signing up to work extra hours just so you could be with me a little longer at work.

Thank you for taking me to the Rascal Flatts concert and wearing that cowboy hat.

Thank you for being such a wonderful father. It means the world to me.

Thank you for going to work every day and excelling in everything you do there.

Thank you for putting up with an emotional/moody/huge/uncomfortable pregnant wife the first year of our marriage.

Thank you for providing us with a home, a car, food, clothing, all the necessities of life.

Thank you for always being so quick to compliment me.

Thank you for holding me every night for almost the past 3 years.

Thank you for always thinking I'm pretty.

Thank you for taking me in your arms and putting my head against your chest when I am upset, for knowing this calms me down instantly and makes me forget about my worries while I'm there.

Thank you for letting me have control over the music (most of the time) during our car rides and for letting me sing and dance to my hearts content.

Thank you for our beautiful daughter. I see you every time I look in her eyes and it makes me so happy to know that even when your not with us, part of you is, in her.

Thank you for being so awesome that you can jump and put both legs in your pants at the same time. hahaha. You really should go to that school for the gifted you were telling me about ; )

Thank you for being drop dead gorgeous, especially when you first wake up.

Thank you for teaching me Spanish a little. Donde esta mi juaves? (I'm sure I spelled that totally wrong)

Thank you for being you. I love you. Everything about you.

Thank you for giving me and our daughter such an amazing life. We are so grateful to have you.

I can play again!

I love playing my piano, but it has been making a strange raddling sound lately. I was very sad because it messed up any song I was trying to play and made it sound horrible. I didn't know what to do.

Then, the other day I'm in the kitchen making some dinner or something and I look over just in time to see Haven pushing a CD into the piano through the little slit on top of the keys. ha! So Scott took off the front of the piano and this is what we found:

There were 5 or 6 cd/dvds and some papers. That would do it! Hooray! I'm so happy to be playing it again. That Haven is quite the little trouble maker :)

This is for Jen

The red coat

it looks better on me. hahaha.

Eight

long time comin Mal- thanks for bein stern with me!

8 favorite T.V. shows: This is tough. I don't really watch too much t.v. I don't think I could think of 8.

8 favorite Restaurants: Much easier. Cheesecake Factory, PF Changs, Asian Star, Black Angus, Wendys, Crown Burger, The Roof, Cafe Rio....oooo can I name one more? Bonsai- Japanese Steak House (someday I will learn to catch shrimp with my mouth).

8 things that happened yesterday: I think in this case, a picture is worth a thousand words.

8 things to look forward to: bed, I'm a little sleepy, TWILIGHT this Friday. I'm sooooooooooooo excited I just might have to blog about it, Haven, Scott, Smores, Book Club...when is that btw?, Seeing my brother and his wife get sealed next month, my life.

8 things on my wish list: that $300 fabulous red coat at J. Crew, eternal life (these are not in order!), brown close toed heels, more highlights (in my hair), Justin to do his residency at the U, an old Victorian mansion, a black Kate Spade handbag, a meat thermometer.

8 things I love about fall: leaves, coldness, coats, sweaters, cardigans, Haven in her cute hats, Thanksgiving, blankets.

Michigan

In case you were wondering....I just got back from spending two weeks in Michigan, hence the uh no posts for forever. My sister/BFF's husband is going to med school there and they just had a sweet little baby girl, Aralea. She is little sister to my wonderful little nephew, Michael, whom I love with my whole heart and miss terribly. My mom, Haven and I flew up together and stayed for two weeks. We had sooo much fun and I cried when I had to say goodbye to my sister, we are closer than close, but I am happy to be back home. Being away from the husb for two weeks was painful and lets face it, I sleep horribly without him holding me.
Here's some pictures from the trip...

Looking out the airplane window.....I think it's sweet.

Look Grandma! I have a sticker on my hand! There were over 600 stickers in that book and she had to show almost all of them to Grandma.

Asleep on Grandma's lap....finally.

A note to all the airplane makers out there- please make sure EVERY airplane has individual TV's on the back of EVERY seat from now on.....could ya? thanks.

Here she is!! Aralea Marie Bowles. 6lbs 5oz. Beautiful as can be.

I miss holding her and feeding her and putting her to sleep. She is so sweet and perfect. Haven adored baby Lea. Every time the baby would cry, she would say "Baby cryin! Shh! Don cry...iss ok!" Michael and Haven = Best Friends Forever. These two became soo close while we were up there. They laughed and played all day. They even learned how to work out their differences, with toy sharing. It made me so happy to see my little darling having so much fun with her cousin.
Master Yoda and Princess Lea. Michael doesn't like getting his picture taken :) They had fun trick or treating together. goodness they are cute.

13 bobby pins later...

playin at the park for Michael's birthday. I love this picture. It looks like happiness to me.

Oh how I love this little girl.

Cold little nose.

I can't stop taking pictures of the little thing. She is so picture perfect to me.

Some other highlights of the trip:

• The billions of multi-colored trees everywhere.
• Staying up till 3am every morning watching LOST webisodes with Kimberly, while we ate cookies, popcorn and drank hot chocolate. We are always so healthy together. hahaha.
• Waking up to Michael and Haven laughing hysterically and jumping in their beds.
• My mom's cooking.
• My mom.
• Shopping with Kimberly
• Making fun of Obama with Kimberly. ba hahaha.
• Toaster Strudels and hot pockets
• The whole Bowles family. They are my fav.

I am: indecisive. don't ask me what my favorite color is. don't ask me what my favorite food is. I DONT KNOW.

I think: of ways to justify expensive things I want. it's true. I'm sorry honey.

I want: Haven and Scott to be happy and healthy all the time.

I have: the most darling little daughter and the handsomest (is that a word?) husband.

I dislike: emptying the dishwasher.

I miss: my sister. She is my BFF and everything I hope to be.

I fear: grasshoppers.

I feel: happy. and a little sleepy.

I hear: Haven in her room, just waking up from a nap saying "Mommy, where are you?"

I smell: like a girl. hm.

I crave: hot chocolate. really anything chocolate.

I cry: because I am a girl and it's part of how we deal.

I usually: dance and sing in the car.

I regret: not listening to my mom more when I was a teen.

I search: for my hair brush every morning. Haven always hides it.

I wonder: out loud about everything when I'm with Scott. He usually knows the answers to my questions but if he doesn't he makes one up that will satisfy me. And I'm ok with that.

I love: my family. more than anything. I seriously have the most amazing beautiful people in my family, including extended.

I care: about what Haven eats, how she sleeps, what she says, what she thinks, what she wants, what she needs, what she wears, her hair, her teath, her health, her happiness.

I always: have fun with Mal.

I am not: complete without Scott.

I remember: that summer in Boulder when we were there for a month with all of my cousins. We played dress-up, house, climbed the Sugar Loaf, swung on the sack swing 16 billion times, slept in sleeping bags that were lined up from one end of the house to the other because there were so many of us, played kick the can at night, andi-i-over, hiked Calf Creek and slid down on our bums into the water, named all the horses, got shakes from poles place, watched movies, played with Lincoln Logs, played lots of tripoly, decorated chairs and made microphones out of yarn so that we could be the spice girls. ah. it was fun.

I believe: in God the eternal Father, in his Son Jesus Christ and in the Holy Ghost.

I dance: all day long.

I sing: all day long.

I don't always: cook. sometimes though ; )

I argue: about expiration dates. I like my food fresh alright? :)

I write: down cute things Haven does and says so I can remember her beautiful one-year-old self.

I win: cake walks. limbo contests. TVs.

I lose: every game I play with Scott.

I wish: I could travel by thought.

I listen: to the spice girls still.

I don't understand: football. And I'm ok with it.

I can usually be found: singing the alphabet, counting toes, trying to get Haven to eat, reading "A Porcupine Named Fluffy"

I watch: Barney, Clifford the big red dog, Sesame Street and Elmo's world on a regular basis.

I need: Scott to hold me at night while I fall asleep.

I forget: to pay my library fines.

I am happy: being me.

Out of Control

Take a look at this tomato plant. Yes, that is just one. We planted it from a little seed and it got a little out of control. It looks more like a tomato bush. We finally pulled everything out of our little garden but this. I don't know what kind of super over-achieving stuff is in the dirt but we had tons of humongous cucumbers and beans...I couldn't keep up with them. It's especially weird because we hardly ever watered the darn thing. And I know your supposed to use a tomato cage, but still....I don't think this is normal. We now have tomatoes growing in our window well because it ran out of room and decided to go down there. Yikes.

Sandy Weekends

Every weekend we pack up and go to Sandy. It is where our family is (Scott's parents, his siblings and their families.). As soon as we're out of the neighborhood, Haven says "Mama, Papa oh boy!!" (Which means, Grandma, Grandpa). She knows where we're goin. Haven looooves Grandma's house. It's her favorite place to be. Not only is she BFFs with Grandma, she has so much fun with her cousin Cody and everyone else. It's our home away from home. It has become a lovely little tradition to have Sunday dinners with the family. It brings us closer and gives us a chance to have a tasty meal. Grandma Hughes always cooks the best food...and seriously I don't even know how many times I've said "Thanks for dinner!". Probably a billion or so times. Sheesh...if she had a dollar for every time I said that...thanks again Cindy!! This weekend was full of fun and food as usual. We stayed for two nights since it was conference weekend. Here is a little taste of what went on...

Grandma gave Haven a BIG piece of paper to color on! As you can see, she thought it was the best thing that had ever happened to her.

She loves to "play" the piano. As soon as her little fingers are big enough, I'm sure Grandma will be teaching her how to play! (She is also my teacher BTW and I am loving learning to play)

She played dress up and danced around the house to the clock that plays music.

Scott and I had a wonderful game of "see who can slide the farthest on their socks down the wood floor".

HE WON!

Haven and Cody had an intense game of rock band.

And of course she had to swing. She was as content as can be.

Saturday night me and my friend Mal went to the Castle of Chaos Haunted house in scary SSL ( south salt lake). It's a little creepy there at night and we were happy not to get stolen walking to and from the car! lol. Apparently everyone else in the valley had the same idea as us because they were all there standing in line at the HH. We didn't really dig the 1 hour wait so we got the VIP passes. Thankfully! It was soo fun and sooo scary. My throat is still hurting from screaming every 5 seconds. Unfortunately, we got some fake blood on our clothes from the blood swamp. I screamed and jumped like 3 feet, ok maybe not 3 feet but I'm sure it was close, into the air and splashed it all over the place. SOO SCARY but I loved it.

And last but not least!!!

Us Hughes' at our finest- midway through last sesh of conference.