p.s.

Did I mention that the other side of this picture:

Looked like this?

Yikes. I get tired just thinking about cleaning up that mess. I'm not the cleanest baker. And I wish I would have taken a picture, but when I was getting the flour out, I had a full on "Home Alone" moment. (It seemed like this happened on "Home Alone" but I might have made it up.) The giant Costco flour bag slipped from my hand and as I was catching it, it dropped and exploded everywhere. All over me, my face, my clothes, the floor, the wall, you name it. It was classic and flour in the eyes is no bueno.

pps- In our defense, the dishes in the dishwasher are clean. So it's not completely slob land.

Tis the Season to be Jolly

December is already zooming by. Michael has been super busy with school. He has a bunch of finals before Christmas break. But puppy helped me get Christmas decorations up. I'm sure our little lady will be willing to help me and puppy next year, right?!

This weekend, Michael had a class/final on Saturday from 7 AM- 5 PM, so I got going on the traditional bread making. I made 16 loaves and I am exhausted. Baby made sure I knew she was not happy with me standing on tile for most of the day. I went to bed at 9 PM more stiff and cramped and more uncomfortable than I have been for a long time. Getting our Christmas gifts out to neighbors before it's too late is worth it though.

So I'm a little over 24 weeks which means at the end of the month, I will be in my 3rd trimester! Yikes. So by demand of some family members, here's the belly. After all the bread making, I wouldn't change out of my flannels even for the picture. sorry.

Still Thankful for Thanksgiving

A little late, but we had a Thanksgiving extravaganza. Wednesday my family (minus Annie) came to town. We had dinner, went and saw "Puss in Boots," and picked Will up from the airport. Thursday morning Will and Michael played in the ward Turkey bowl and came home with torn clothes...jeesh.

My mom and I started getting Thanksgiving dinner ready. Boy, did I feel out of my league. My mom makes cooking a feast for 15 look easy. Finally, everyone was here, tables were set and dinner was ready.

We had both sets of my grandparents, my parents, my uncle and 3 of his kids, Will, Melanie and Camille all at our house! Dinner was delicious if I do say so myself. And the wonderful thing about AZ is that after dinner, we all sat outside to share what we are thankful for and play some games before we had pie.

Thanksgiving day was not the end of our adventures. The next morning we drove to San Diego for Melanie's soccer tournament. It was a huge tournament with lots of college recruiters. It was exciting to see Mel's team advance and win Semis! While Michael and I were driving back to AZ, her team went on to become the "Best of the Best" Champions! She's awesome.

My dad got us an awesome room right off of Torrey Pines golf course. This was seriously our view from our room's giant balcony.

In between all of the games, Michael, my dad, and Will somehow managed to find time to play a round of golf. I'm pretty sure they all felt like they were in heaven that day. My hubby was pretty giddy about it...

While the boys were out golfing, my mom, Melanie, Camille and I went for a hike to the beach. At first, I thought it was a quick walk. Luckily, I changed into comfy hiking clothes because it really was a hike. 3.4 miles to be exact. It was beautiful though. We were walking through pretty foliage and around cliffs that dropped us off on the beach at sunset. Picturesque? I think so.

One night after dinner, we stopped at the San Diego temple. Man, it is so beautiful. We were bummed they hadn't turned on their Christmas lights yet though. We missed them by a couple of days.

On our last night there, we went to Old Town and had some nice Mexican food. We also did the Mormon Batallion Visitor Center. I'm pretty sure it was my first time going there and I thought it was so fun. Michael liked seeing the footage that was filmed at his old job and we all loved our family picture!

It was an amazing weekend! This week was definitely rough to come back to reality, but we have a lot to be grateful for. That makes the tough days not as hard.