We're Having A Baby!

Yep, it's true and we're super excited! We announced it earlier at Thanksgiving to our immediate family members with a fake Christmas card, where instead of our regular update on the back it had this cute poem (don't mind the logo over 2015):

Both of our families were super excited, but they all knew we were trying so I don't think anyone was truly surprised. Still such a fun way to announce it to them!

We finally went to the doctor when we were 10 weeks along and saw our baby's heartbeat. It looked strong and healthy, and baby was moving around a ton! It made us both think it was a little guy (David is the busy one in this household), but we'll see. We did not get a picture because the images weren't that great during the ultrasound, but we'll hopefully get one at our next appointment.

Then when we were in Colorado for Christmas, my dad took this great picture and we put it up on Facebook to announce to other family and friends. He did a great job and we love how it turned out:

Can't wait to ski with our little one in years to come!

Thanksgiving 2014 Recap

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays of the year. I am always so excited to see family, eat lots of yummy food, and get everything ready for Christmas! This year we had the best of both worlds; we spent the first few days with David's family and then the last few with my family. Splitting the holiday was so fun, and I am so grateful for our wonderful families!

David's family came out and we all stayed at a condo up in Park City. We had the best time hanging out and playing tons of games. We also tried to take some group pics (just with an iPhone) but they turned out okay! 

Love this guy.

I definitely lucked out with my in-laws. I seriously have so much fun with these ladies:

All the boys. Love that little baby Nix!

And the whole group. Jessie put her phone on top of Daniel's car and this is what we got on the first try...not too shabby!

The cute condo we stayed at:

We celebrated Thanksgiving dinner with the Drakes, but unfortunately didn't get any pictures. It was delicious though! That evening we drove out to Colorado and got in super late. We skied Friday and Saturday and had a great time. Oh, it felt so good to be back on the slopes. My legs were burning though and definitely need to get back into skiing shape!

Here we are at the bus stop after the first day of skiing:

Besides skiing, we went Black Friday shopping and also out to eat our last night at our favorite Italian place. And here's another picture of the cutest kids you ever did see!

It was so fun to watch Ty try and ski. We can't wait to be back in about 3 weeks for Christmas! Thank you to both of our families for everything and being so much fun :)

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween! Hopefully you are going to celebrate, eat candy/treats, and/or possibly watch something scary tonight. We will probably hand out some candy while watching Hocus Pocus (because I honestly can't handle anything scarier than that). Over the past few weeks we have had a great time celebrating the holiday by going to Frightmares (at Lagoon), the Cornbellies Corn mazes & haunted houses, going to a halloween party where we carved pumpkins and by eating lots of pumpkin treats and candy corn. 

This is at Frightmares with two of David's dental classmates and their wives. We had a blast going through the haunted houses and riding all the rides:

 This year for a Halloween party we dressed up as Squints and Wendy Peffercorn from The Sandlot: 

And if you don't know who they are, maybe this will help you out:

And this: 

Love this nerd ;)

With my good friend, Carly a.k.a. Little Red Riding Hood:

David was really intense while carving, but never even finished his. Haha it was going to be a mouth.

Here are all the pumpkins (excluding David's):

This was mine! I used a stencil and thought it turned out kind of cute:

At the corn mazes with our good friends, Dave & Aubrey. He was one of David's mission companions and we love hanging out with them:

Conference Weekend in Cali

Two weeks ago we went to northern California to visit my sister and her family. We found some really cheap tickets and it was such a good deal we couldn't pass up the opportunity. Although it was a quick trip (Friday AM - Sunday PM) we had a blast and it was totally worth it!

Some fun highlights from the weekend include going to the pool (it was almost 100 degrees in October!), getting hour long massages for only $25, watching inspirational talks given by our prophet and apostles in General Conference, going to the pumpkin patch/farmer's market, going out to eat for delicious food and ice cream, and just eating tons of yummy food and visiting (plus David did a lot of studying with sports on in the background). We had a great time. Thanks Carrie and Andrew for letting us come visit!

David and Ty playing during conference, so cute:

Autumn Happenings

Well it's my favorite time of year again! I really do like Autumn and can't seem to get enough of the changing leaves, decorations, and fall treats. In the spirit of the season, I made a wreath that I think turned out kinda cute. It was so easy and super cheap (I got the fake flowers on sale at Michael's and already had the burlap). So in all, maybe like $15 bucks? And I just used twisty ties to attach the flowers (instead of hot gluing like in the tutorial) so I can replace them with white/other seasonal colors whenever I want. Also, how cute is that burlap bow? I was pretty proud of myself for tying that! Also don't mind the weird lighting- it was in the morning after my run.

A few weeks ago we had a neighborhood party. My neighbors down the street have a beautiful home and yard and they hosted it. You can see the whole valley from their backyard, it's pretty neat.

I was on the committee that helped plan and throw it, and it was a big party to plan for, let me tell you! We probably had around 200-250 people that came, and had a BBQ dinner, live band, line dancing at one point, and a bounce house and face painting for the kids. It was a huge success and a ton of fun!

 We have also enjoyed some of the beautiful canyons near us. I love the changing colors! David's dental class did a bonfire a couple of weeks ago and we had the best time. Then David and I went up to Brighton one morning to help clean up and winterize the girls camp up there for our church. It was so colorful and crisp up in the mountains and sometimes I forget how close they are. This is just a snap I took while we drove up:

And speaking of dental school, David is staying real busy. He is still loving it, which makes me happy. Recently, they practiced suturing up pigs. Apparently his teacher knows a guy who sells pig parts (whaaat?), so they had heads and feet that they would make an incision into and then practice sewing them right up. I am grateful for David's classmates who post pictures, because he is not a picture taker.

Here is David with a classmate working on a pig foot (with his new hat I got him!):

And again when they all practiced giving local anesthesia on each other (the teacher was demonstrating here I think):

LOOK AWAY if you hate needles. Sorry, too late? Anyways, thanks for catching up with our lives!

Labor Day Weekend 2014

I know this is about a month late, but for Labor Day weekend we went out to the condo in Colorado with my family and our good friends, the Bevans (who we also went to Whitefish with earlier this summer). We loved showing them around the area and hanging out. The first day we rented bikes and rode from Frisco to Breckenridge, which was fun and also semi-challenging so we didn't feel as bad when we splurged on all the pizza and carbs at Giampietro in Breckenridge. It is seriously the best restaurant- if you are in Breck ever, then GO. 

Some other fun things from the long weekend included shopping at the outlets, eating out, stopping in Vail on our way home, going to the food festival at Keystone and playing lots of cards (a must with the Bevans!) We had a great time and are so glad to have such fun friends and family! 

The Last Days of Summer 2014

This summer has been one of the best, but also one of the busiest! David has been back in school for almost 2 weeks now, and summer seems to be winding down.

A few weeks ago my mom and sister Aimee came into town and we loved spending time with them. Aimee is a river guide in Moab for the summer and I am so jealous of her super tanned skin- that used to be me! We spent one morning hiking the Y in Provo, which is always a lung-buster.

 She's a champ for hiking up that mountain in flip-flops. Chacos = best flips ever. Here is cute Aimee celebrating the end of the hike in "Y" fashion:

In other randomness, not too many things make me much happier than Zupas. David was busy one night so I went out to dinner by myself and read my book out on the patio, which ended up being a fabulous and relaxing evening (I know, I sound like an old person...)

Speaking of books, I've been reading a TON lately. Some of my favorites have been the Legend trilogy (Hunger Games fans will love this), Pivot Point, the 5th Wave (different but great sci-fi), and some regency romances like Edenbrooke (I like a variety of genres, obviously). Goodreads is one of my favorite things as well as Overdrive. I am constantly looking for good books to read, so if you have any suggestions send them my way!

 It has been very stormy lately, which seems to be welcoming Autumn sooner than normal (I have mixed feelings about it). One night I was out for a walk and just loving the view, so I tried to capture some lightening across the valley. Obviously it didn't work, but I never get sick of these mountains

My good friend Shannon, who I grew up with, travels out to good old SLC once a month for her job. It is so fun to get together and catch up! We have done a bunch of hikes this summer including one up emigration canyon, one up by Brighton ski resort, and we just hiked to the "Y" in Provo. I showed her around campus first and we drove around Provo, and then we hiked during the most beautiful sunset!

Using her cool Go-Pro! Those things are so neat!

David has been so busy lately! This summer was his only summer break in all of dental school, so besides traveling, we spent a lot of time together doing things that included going boating a few times, having lots of family & friend barbeques, and honestly, watching a lot of Netflix. It was so nice! Not only has year two of dental school begun, but he is still tutoring some students with Kaplan that he started this summer, and staying busy with church callings. I can barely keep up with his crazy schedule, but I am real proud of all his hard work. I sure love that guy and we have had a fabulous summer. Here's to hoping he I will survive year two of dental school!