Winter Wonderings

January has really just flown by this year.  It usually seems that January is the slowest month of the entire year, but this year with the warm winter and holidays and being preoccupied with other things time has flown.  I know that sounds so clique but oh well.  I still can't believe the warm winter that we are having this year.  I am supposed to live the in the "ice box" of Utah but we don't even have snow on the ground. Sawyer wishes we would get some new snow.  Travis taught him how to eat snow and  now he tries to eat snow all the time, even if it is old and dirty. A real mothers dream, yuck! The other day was trying to lick the frost off of his ball his left outside.  Silly child.
We were down in Minersville recently for Julie's missionary farewell.  She has been called to serve in the Eugene, Oregon mission.  This is so cool because it actually covers my old home ward in Yreka, CA.  One of the best Wards in the entire world. While we were in Minersville we enjoyed some outside time, as you can see below. Sawyer would get on the tire horse, ride for a little bit, then tell me I needed to get on so he could pull me.  He is so funny and random.
Julie went into the MTC on Wed.  It is so crazy, it feels like just yesterday we dropped my little sister off at the MTC and she will be home in April.  I can't believe she has been in Bolivia for almost 18 months.  I can't wait for her to get home to have my running partner again.

Sam and Sawyer were the best of buds until they both wanted something the other had, pretty typical I guess for boys this age.  These boys will have such a hard time when their new baby siblings come along.  They convinced Grandma to pull them on this small patch of snow in the back yard.  Grandma was more than happy to oblige.  She even jumped on the trampoline with them.  I would have tried the trampoline too but with this baby I have to use the bathroom all the time and I didn't want to test my luck with bouncing up and down.  

Does it come with a pay raise?????

Crafty, Crafty

I have had this project in mind for quite awhile now.  I am just really bad about having an idea and making things happen apparently.  I wanted to make Sawyer a growth chart that we can have and that can move with us throughout our lives.  I saw one on Facebook that was super cute and decided I can do that too. I enlisted the help of Travis to help cut wood, sand, paint, and help get the lines straight.  Okay so basically I was more of a project manager than the real crafter.  I was really excited with the results though, I think it turned out really good.  Sawyer really likes it as well since it has balls on it.  

Ice Fishing

Travis convinced me to take a ride with him out to Newton Res. to see if there was ice on the reservoir. He said I will just test it and then we can go home.  There was also the incentive of going on a ride will put Sawyer to sleep.  I should have known better.  Sawyer must have known there was a possibility of going fishing because he didn't even close his eyes once.  

Travis dug a test hole to make sure the ice was thick enough.  I believe 11 inches is thick enough but I was still a little nervous.  One of my worst fears is falling through ice but lets face it I think a lot of people fear this. 

Travis dug a hole to start us fishing in while he dug another one.  Sawyer thought he was in hog heaven.  He loved fishing but he didn't really get the concept of reeling the line in he just get bobbing the line in the hole.  We didn't stay too long out on the ice.  The sun was going down and Sawyer was getting a little restless.  We left the ice with only one injury.  Sawyer slipped and tried to catch himself with his hands but they slipped too.  He hit his head and got a few raspberries on his forehead.  Poor little guy.  

We took a little tour through the valley on the way home to ensure that Sawyer fell asleep on the way home.  It was a great day, one of the last great days for awhile.  It snowed the next day and this week has been cold, just like the Cache Valley we all know and love.  

Just like Daddy

Run Run Rudolph

This holiday season seemed to go by way too fast, isn't that how it always is though?  I seriously got my shopping done like three days before Christmas.  I try every year to get it done early but it never seems to happen.  I always think of last minute ideas.  I try to write a list throughout the year of Christmas present ideas but it seems when Christmas comes nothing seems right.  

This year we headed down to Minersville to Travis' family for Christmas this year.  It was a pretty hectic Christmas day.  We started by getting ready for church then heading over to Katie's to open presents.  I was thinking since Sawyer was a little older this year he would be more excited about the presents, especially since he carried the presents all over the house in Logan. I made the mistake of giving Sawyer his presents of Nerf Balls 2nd and that was all he wanted.  He was so silly.  

After presents we ate a yummy breakfast and headed to church.  Sawyer was wild at church.  He is used to being confined in a side bench so he has room to get down and move around a bit, but we sat on the back row that doesn't have any seating in front of it.  Sawyer was in hog heaven but it made for a bit of a hell for his parents.  We had to leave before sacrament was out to head over to Circleville.  Krista, my sister on an LDS mission in Bolivia, was calling at one in the afternoon.  We made it over the mountain just in time. It was fun to talk to her and hear her voice.  She gets home in March/April.  

When we all said our Merry Christmas' to Krista we headed over to Uncle Todd's for some amazing food.  Two kinds of prime rib, cheesy potatoes, deviled eggs, rolls, etc, YUM!!! We visited for a bit but had to head back to Grandma and Grandpa's to open more presents.  Our presents to my parents and grandparents was the coveted Aggie ice cream, Caramel Cashew.  That ice cream is divine.  We convinced them they needed to share a bit with the family before we headed back over to Minersville.  

All in all we enjoyed ourselves and ate way too much over the holiday.  We are so grateful for all of our families for making Christmas memorable. 

Sawyer put my necklace right on, silly boy. 

Matrix style opening presents

'Tis the Season of Partying

We started this holiday season with an Ugly Sweater party with some friends, Tom and Sam. It was fun to get together and eat some great food.  We played our favorite couples party game, the Newlywed Game- like the old gameshow.  It is so entertaining.  It is funny to see how much you do and don't really know about your spouse, or what you think you know about your spouse.  I just hope the game doesn't cause too much contention afterwards for wrong answers.  

Travis actually won the ugliest sweater.  We had to search high and low for ugly sweaters, and honestly, I don't think mine is that awful, am I getting old?  It seems everybody was looking for an ugly sweater this season.  We found one for Travis that was awesome, it was as you can see, a nasty color.  Since we got them at a thrift store I decided to make sure we kill anything that could possibly be on them, I soaked them all night in the washer.  Well I have never really worked with real wool before so when I got Travis' sweater out in the morning it had seriously shrunk like two sizes, and it developed a lot of holes.  I had no idea wool was so difficult. 

Family Pictures in front of the fire place. 

The Hollands our gracious hosts

 Travis has a kind of meet and greet with an engineering firm in Richfield in December.  It worked out that it happened to be the same weekend as the annual Yardley Christmas party.  This party is a pretty big event.  It has been going on every year for at least 40+ years.  We haven't been down in quite a few years so we were all excited to go.  We went and stayed in Circleville at my grandparents.  

Sawyer loves going to my grandparents house and helping Grandpa with the chores.  Sawyer thinks that when Grandpa goes outside he needs to go with him.  In the morning Grandpa would wrap Sawyer in a blanket to go out and feed the horses. Whenever Sawyer would see  Grandpa going for the door he would go grab his blanket so he could go outside too, it didn't matter what time of day it was.  

On Saturday Travis, Grandpa, and Sawyer were out checking things around the valley, i.e. looking for deer, coyotes, and elk, when they ran into Santa.  Apparently, he visited the city building to see what the kids wanted for Christmas.  Sawyer did okay with Santa but he didn't want to be on there for very long.  Afterwards, Grandpa decided to give Sawyer his first driving lesson.  It was a pretty scary ride home.  Good thing it was in a small town.  

" I would like some footballs, and a firetruck please"

Don't worry I got this

 The party was in Parowan this year.  Uncle David and Aunt Margaret's family did a great job with the food, entertainment, and delicious treats.  When we got there we handed out our Christmas card which had a particular incriminating photo on it.  I gave the card to my sister and mom first.  My sister looked at the card first and yelled to me across the room "Are you really pregnant?"  "Yep sure am, Mariah".  It spread like wildfire through the whole party.  It was a pretty fun way to tell everybody.  We finished handed out the rest of the card to make sure nobody was left out.  So it is finally out that we are expecting a baby in July of this year.  

After dinner conversations

Sam and Sawyer riding the horse.  It was right before this that we thought Sam would hold Sawyer on the horse while we took the picture.  Apparently, Sam thought Sawyer was big enough to hold on by himself.  Sawyer slid right off, hence while Vanessa is hold him in the picture. 

Uncle Dale Ride Him

Grandma and The Saw Man

Sam and Trexton Cheesing it

Feeding the horses

We spend the rest of the weekend in Circleville.  We went looking for Turkey feathers on day at Doc Springs.  It was fun until I got a little lost and hung up, literally, in the shrubbery.  We did end up finding a few feathers, a dead cow, and lots of tracks.  

On Monday we headed down to Richfield for the meet and greet.  My Grandparents came with us to do a little shopping.  We went to a lot of different stores and ate at a great sandwich shop.  I love sandwiches by the way.  It was a long day but enjoyable.  We wore Sawyer out.  He was eating a pretzel and fell asleep mid-chew.  We had a really great and relaxing weekend.  Just what I needed before Christmas.  

Running In A Winter Wonderland

This past month I had to take advantage of some races here in Cache Valley, since we may not be here next year.  They have a running club here, Cache Sun and Snow Runners, that sponsors some really fun races.  They always have a lot of participants and tons of fun prizes.  I just wish I was more lucky at winning the great prizes.  I need Krista back, I swear that girl not only wins the race she always wins cool stuff.
The 1st race I ran was the First Dam Run 10k.  I signed up for this race and did not check the weather.  It was Nov. 5 and of course it snowed in the valley the night of the 4th.  It was so cold, I have ran this race many times before and it is always interesting what the weather will be like.  This is the first time I have had to run in snow though.  A couple of years ago I ran in shorts and a long sleeve shirt.  Besides not being able to feel my toes for about the first mile and a half the race was actually quite enjoyable.  I even had to shed some layers along the way.  It was a good race minus the last mile.  I was running so well, on the pace I wanted and then I had an issue.  It was nice to have a cheering section when I finished and during the race.

The 2nd race was the Smithfield Turkey Trot.  I ran the 10 K again, well running is a bit of an overstatement, I skated a bit of the race too because again it snowed.  They were able to scrape the roads but it was so cold the layer they left on the road was just ice.  It made for an interesting race.  This 10K is by far one of the hardest ones I have ran around here, it is like 4 miles up hill and one mile down hill, 3/4 miles flat and then the last 1/4 is uphill again.  Yes, you finish on an uphill.  I like uphill more than downhill but it is still rough.  Travis and Sawyer came and cheered me on again.  They are such good sports to come and watch me since these races are rather long.