Christmas!!!

This was our 4th Christmas together being married!! Can you believe it?? I know I cant. Each year has been more fun than the last. Sad to say we couldn't fit my Camera case in my suit case and we already had to many carry on items...(I hate flying now, they charge you twice for everything!!) So we do not have any pictures that I have taken. So I am going to steal some pictures off of my families blogs. haha

Mable:
Our trip first started off with taking Mable (our 7 month old Beagle) to the Kennel Boarding place. As nervous parents of a puppy we checked out the place a week before we dropped her off. It was so sad i almost cried leaving her there. When we walked in she just sat on the floor and wouldn't move. The guy had to pick her up and take her in the back. Broke my heart. We bought her a couple of new toys to play with while we were away. We even put up a stocking for her. Are we lame or what? haha

Spending Money:
We then went to our school book store and sold back our text books so we could have Christmas spending money. We made $200.00 bucks! It lasted a week.....with Gas and luggage fees...sad day!

Drive to Richmond:
We then drove on Sunday night to Richmond (2 hours away) to our good friends The Sharps house. We stayed up late talking with them and then went to IHOP for breakfast in the morning. Nate drove us to the airport and babysat our car!
Nate, Alyson, Trey, and Jayci....we seriously love you guys! Thanks again! oh and the season of the Black Donnelly's was kick A, besides when it cut off and didn't continue the story....does the mom die? Does she go with him? Does that bad guy die from poisoning? I guess we will never know.

Plane Ride:
Then after luggage fees galore we get on the plane to Newark,NJ....seriously the bumpiest airplane ride ever...I almost woofed my cookies (as my dad would say). The plane to Arizona from there was so much better. My parents picked us up from the airport and we got to spend the first week of our trip with them.

The Madsen Household:
We spent time shopping, making fudge, visiting with my grandma, aunts, uncles and cousins. Luke and my bros were obsessed playing this video game and spent all their time trying to beat it. But we didn't care us ladies made crafts!!! My sister taught us how to make these really cute wood snow men. I taught my mom and sis how to sew their own purses/scripture bags. We had a little too much fun! We also went with my brother to see the movie Valkyrie with Tom Cruise. We really enjoyed it. We were able to eat at: IN and OUT, Hungry Howie's, Monti's, and Chino Banditos. (I am sure that is not that exciting to some, but humor me its been over 2 years since we have enjoyed their mighty tasty food.) Anyways, my sister, Luke and I went to the temple to do initiatories. It was so cool because my mom was working there that day and she was able to perform the ordinance for us. Really neat. We also got to finally take some family photos of all of us. Thanks for a wonderful trip!

Christmas:
We spent Christmas eve with my family and had a delicious soup and bread bowl dinner then onto the Christmas program, with carols, and battle of the sexist game (Thanks Matty Patty)! We had Mom, Dad, Alissa, Mark, Weston, Hunter, Matt, Kyle, Luke, Me, Grandma, Jill, and Kevin there. We then drove that night to The Taylor household to help set up all of "Santa's" loots for the grand kids. Its super neat because all 10 grand kids come over to Marmie and Popies for Christmas morning. So we all could spend Christmas together in one house. They do this tradition every year which is so much fun! We stayed up till about 2am. And then the kids came over at 7am. We watched them go nuts over their loots and then exchanged gifts that we got for each other. After that we opened what was inside our HUGE stockings!! After Christmas morning with the Taylor's we headed back to the Madsen's to finish Christmas Day. We got to see our 2 nephews on my side play with all of their "Sweet" toys (as Hunter said it). And then exchanged all of our fun crafty gifts! We hung out, took a needed nap, played games and went to a movie.

The Taylor Household:
After a nice long week with the Madsen's we headed over to the Taylor's. We spent a lot of our time with Debi, Garry, Nick, Allison, Cami, Mark, Gavin, Katelyn, Michael, Stefani, Troy, Andee, Noah, Will, Hannah, Josh, Nat, Wendy, Jaxon, and Rylee! And that is just the immediate family. We also spent a ton of time partying it up with aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends. We had a couple of family parties playing lots of games. We played American Idol (yes I actually sang, Luke did too), Mario cart, Jax, Gestures, Mad Gab, and this Bag game where you had to be extremely flexible....I had 2 lines left, Luke had one left (yes he is more flexible than me) and Cami was the winner of that game....she got all the way down! We got to eat at Tomo's (we are soooo trendy, We love Sushi), Red Robin, Zuka Juice, paradise bakery, and TJ's. We went shopping, made cinnamon rolls, went to Costco and went sample testing (Debi and Rylee), and had lots of fun! We also went with Garry and Debi to see the Curious Case of Benjamin Button...I highly recommend it!! Thanks guys for a wonderful Christmas!

Friends:
About 2 days after we got to AZ I went to get my hair trimmed by one of my best friends Valerie...well she ended up chopping my hair to my shoulders!!!! What do ya think? We did a trade and i took her families pictures...we seriously took over 500! We got to eat dinner with them at Someborros!! We also were able to visit with Angie, Kevin , and baby Reece....sorry we couldn't do more! We visited with Whitney and Zack Vance at Chino Banditos and at their house. We hung out with TJ, Nani, Kaitaia, and Tiki at our family party! We saw Houston and Kara Reynolds in the temple. We wish we could have seen more of our friends but its so hard seeing everyone we want to in a 2 week period. We tried Trisha!

Thanks everyone for a wonderful Christmas we cant wait until next year!!!!

Here are just a few pics i stole off of my sis and sis-in-laws blogs!