Ugly Sweater Party

A couple weeks ago we went to an Ugly Sweater Christmas Party that our friends Jillian and Jonathan had. We had a pretty hard time finding ugly sweaters since we went to the good will store last minute but others had some pretty good ones.

The hosts, Jonathan and Jillian

Marc and Chelle
Marc's sweater reminded me of a costume from Blades of Glory.

Liz and Scott

Baby William (Liz and Scott's baby) wore a Christmas elf suit

Janis and Troy. Troy won the contest for Ugliest Sweater. He took branches off a real Christmas tree and glued it to a sweatshirt with 2 candy canes. So creative!

Thanks for a great time!

Decorating for Christmas

Choosing our Christmas tree this year was so easy. We went to the gym one night and then stopped at Mikey's Christmas tree lot which was in the same parking lot. They had great trees and it only took us a few minutes to find this one.


Decorating the Tree

The finished product

Aaron getting out the decorations

We still put out our little Christmas tree we had our first Christmas married

Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving we were able to go to Manteca and celebrate at the Carter's with the Hoffman's. We went down Wednesday night and I spent the night making pies, while Dee prepared the potatoes.

For some reason the crust just wouldn't stay together! Notice the side that fell off. It was very frustrating but ended up tasting delicious.
The finished products

Hillary also made delicious pumpkin bars

Here is what Aaron spent the night doing

playing on his i phone, which he does a lot these days
Thanksgiving Day
Dee with the yummy turkey

The beautiful table. Notice the sugar rimmed glasses. Mmmmm.

Hillary pouring the punch

Lori and Hillary

Carla and Buzz

Me and Aaron

Jim and Dee

Aaron and Eric

After our delicious meal, we played Apples to Apples. It was so fun that even after Aaron won we continued playing.

By the end of the day we were so full all we could to was lay around.

Pumpkin Carving

just a little late...
Even though we went to the pumpkin patch when we were visiting Alamo, we didn't get pumpkins because we thought we would go again and could get pumpkins up here. Of course it never happened. We decided we were going to carve pumpkins with Wes and Lani the night before Halloween and we still hadn't bought pumpkins. I don't recommend doing this because we had to go to 3 stores and even then, only found the bottom of the barrel pumpkins. Luckily you can't see their deformities.
Here we are carving

The finished products

Wes and Aaron mimicking their carvings

Lani and Me

A close up of my ghosts

A close up of Aaron's goblin holding a trick or treat bag

On Halloween we went down to the Carter's and had dinner with Aaron's immediate and extending family. We didn't make it in time to see the trick or treaters but here is a great picture of tiger Landon.

Hillary's Volleyball Game

Aaron's little sister Hillary recently finished her last year playing varsity volleyball at East Union High School. She has played since her Freshman year. Her games were always too early for us both to make it down to watch, but Aaron was able to go after school one day and got some great footage. In this clip, the other team is serving. Hillary is the first to touch the ball after the serve, #12 on the left side of the net. Then watch her get the point.


Team Huddle


Her name up in the gym on display - Carter #12


Aaron and Hill after the game


Her games have always been so much fun to watch--we're sad it's over! Congrats on a great volleyball career Hillary!

Upgrade!

On Thursday as Aaron and I were eating lunch I had a brilliant idea. I thought, "I wonder if we can exchange the free ipod touch we got and upgrade to an iphone?" I decided to call Apple to find out if they would do an exchange without a receipt and with a used ipod touch but had the worst time getting ahold of someone. Finally I was able to get through and after talking to the lady, didn't have much hope. She basically told me that without a receipt she didn't think I could do anything. She also said I would have to find out where it was purchased.
I was able to call the company that gave me the ipod touch and found out that it was purchased at Best Buy. I tried calling Best Buy but once again had the hardest time getting through. I finally talked to someone that told me I almost definitely would need a receipt (but of course I didn't have one since I won it) but to come in and try anyway. Aaron and I went to Best Buy with very low expectations and were ecstatic when we found out that they would do it! We were able to exchange the ipod touch for a new iphone and since Aaron had an upgrade available through AT&T for his phone, we got the special price. We left with a new iphone for Aaron and a Best Buy card with the remaining credit. Amazing!!!
I inherited Aaron's ipod classic and now he has the iphone with the same ipod capabilities as the ipod touch. We are both happy.
We went from this

to all this

FOR FREE! Well, except for the upgrade we had to make to our cell phone plan, but now we get internet.

Eight

(originally tagged by Mel for 6 Quirks but can't think of any)

Eight TV shows I like to watch:
1. Survivor
2. Lost
3. Chuck
4. Biggest Loser
5. Heroes
6. The Office
7. The Amazing Race
8. America's Next Top Model

Eight things that happened yesterday:
1. went to work
2. ate a Safeway sandwich for lunch
3. watched Biggest Loser
4. read blogs
5. emailed
6. played Mind the Blox on addictinggames.com
7. went visiting teaching
8. booked a flight to Utah for Feb 5-8 Woohoo!!!
Not the most exciting day ever...

Eight Favorite Places to Eat:
1. Cafe Rio (Costa Vida in CA)
2. Red Robin
3. Chili's
4. Chevy's
5. TGI Friday's
6. Taco Bell
7. Panda Express
8. La Provence (just went there for the first time. It was divine)

Eight things I am looking forward to:
1. Thanksgiving
2. Christmas
3. Going to Utah in February
4. Going to Mexico with the Carter's in June
5. Going to Hawaii with the Coons' next November
6. Aaron graduating
7. Seeing Don and Brad on Saturday, along with the rest of the fam
8. Twilight on Friday

Eight people I tag
(unless you've already done this)

1. Melanie B.
2. Mandy T.
3. Tari B.
4. Anna C.
5. Lyndsey C.
6. Mom
7. Lani C.
8. Adrienne E.

Auction Necklace

Last month I did a post about Stephanie Nielson and her husband who were in a plane crash this past August. I also have the buttons on the side of my blog so that you can learn more about them, be inspired by Nie's blog and donate to their recovery.
Well, one of the many ways to donate is through the auction thursdaysfornie.blogspot.com. Last Thursday I participated in the auction and got this awesome necklace.

It is so unique and is even better in person. I love it and feel even happier knowing that I was able to help the Nielson family in some small way.
What can you do to help? Click on the Nie Recovery button to find out.

Woo-hoo!

Yesterday was a big day for me. I got my very own ipod touch.

Not only is it my first ipod, I also got it for FREE. The company that we use for new carpet and vinyl held a giveaway and I was the lucky order number. It wasn't really "luck" because they called and told me to place an order at that moment to win. I happily did and had so much fun last night uploading music and games on my ipod touch. Did you know there's a free air hockey game that two people actually touch the screen and play eachother!? Aaron and I had fun doing that.
It was also a big day because the new Taylor Swift CD came out and I bought it and then uploaded it to my ipod touch.

Technology is so wonderful.

Meet Judy Grimes

Hey everyone, it's Aaron. This is one of the funniest things I have seen in quite awhile that I saw on Saturday Night Live and thought I would put it on the blog for fun. Kristen Wiig is an amazing comedian. Enjoy!

The Amazing Race

On Saturday night we were invited to participate in The Amazing Race, put on by the Carruth's, some friends in our ward.

There were about 25-30 people that were divided into five teams. We were lucky enough to be put with Stacey and Drew, and Brad and Julianne.
Our first clue led us to the Nugget grocery store parking lot where we had to search the entire lot for a car with a specific license plate number. Once found, we were given our first task.
I got to dance on the corner of Pleasant Grove and Fairway Dr (a major intersection) dressed in a Mr. Pickles costume for 2 whole songs on a portable radio. If you don't believe me, watch this video. This can go on my list of most embarassing moments. It wasn't really that bad but I wouldn't have volunteered if I hadn't lost rock, paper, scissors.


Drew, Stacey, me aka Mr Pickles, Julianne, and Brad
After the first task, we had a mandatory 15 minute minimum eating break at U-Food grill.

Once we finished we got our next clue which led us to Big Spoon Yogurt. We had to get 20 oz of yogurt and 4 oz of toppings and together, eat it all as fast as we could before getting the next clue.
We then went back to where we started at the Carruth's house and had to successfully play through one song on Rock Band. Our team rocked it!

Our next clue led us to another home where we had to complete a 200 piece puzzle of a map of the world. We only took 12 minutes!
After finishing the puzzle, our final clue led us to the last task at another home. One member of the team had to jump in the deep end of the pool and locate the canadian penny among 19 other american pennies.
Brad took one for the team with no hesitation. He found the penny quickly and we were in and out within 5 minutes.

When we finished the last leg of the race we returned to the Carruth's house.

We got there first and we were so excited!!!! However, we soon found out that there was a bonus challenge. We were given a soundtrack at the beginning of the race and our last challenge was to write down as many songs as we could remember within 90 seconds. Unfortunately we could only think of 5. Each song was worth a one minute time bonus, taken off our total time. The next team got there about 15 minutes later but they were able to write down 16 songs. They came in ahead of us by 2 minutes with the time bonus.
We still took pride in the fact that we finished first and look forward to the next Amazing Race.

Brad's Mission Call

Well, I guess no one really wanted to guess at where Brad is going so I'll just tell you.
Brad has been called to serve in the AUSTRALIA ADELAIDE MISSION! He reports to the MTC on March 4th, 2009.
We are so incredibly excited for him and think it's awesome that he's going to Australia. He will be English speaking.
Adelaide is the capital of Southern Australia and is on the south coast.

It looks like a beautiful place!


And there is even a temple in Adelaide!

We are so excited for the opportunity Brad has to serve the Lord in Australia. We love you Brad!