Travel Ornaments

Before I put all my Christmas stuff away I thought I'd share a little tradition we have.

Wherever Howie and I travel to we always pick up an ornament.

It's fun to get them out and reminisce.

Lake Tahoe, CA/NV - Honeymoon June to July 2008

Virginia City, NV - Honeymoon 2008 

Yellowstone - June to July 2009 

Jackson Hole - July 2009 

London, England - May 2010 

Scotland - May 2010 

 Edinburgh, Scotland - May 2010

Paris, France - May 2010 

Maui, HI - September 2010

Oahu, HI - October 2010 

I hope to fill our tree with these someday.

Merry Christmas

Fun Fact: Best present this year was my Kindle.

I can't wait to start using it!

Better Fact: Howie and I got engaged three years ago today.

I love that he proposed to me on Christmas Day because it brings back those happy feelings every year.

I love it.

Merry Christmas everyone.

Christmas Wrapping

I found the cutest wrapping paper at Toys R Us.

 I don't think I've ever been more excited about wrapping paper!

Best $8 I've spent this year.

Kurt Bestor and Temple Square

On Saturday Howie and I enjoyed a lovely breakfast at Mimi's Cafe (the only thing Mimi's is good for in my opinion).

Afterward, we headed to the Kurt Bestor Concert at Abravanel Hall.

Here is the Kurt Bestor stage.  You can see Kurt there on the screens.

One of his special guests was American Idol Jason Castro!

Here he is performing "Hallelujah", which he also performed on A.I..

On Sunday night I went to Temple Square with my family.

Howie had to work that night so, he couldn't join us. 

The lights were amazing, but for some reason they didn't put lights on the big, big trees.

That made me sad. 

Here is everyone minus me.  Someone had to take the picture! 

Here's the nativity. 

This Temple is so gorgeous. 

It was a lovely 50º while we checked out the lights, but we did get rained on.

We all went home soaked, but it was a fun evening!

A Candlelight Christmas

We loved A Candlelight Christmas at This Is The Place Heritage Park last year so much that we had to do it again this year.  First we visited Santa:

Made fun of some fake carolers:

(In case you can't tell, i'm making fun of the smallest boy.  Scary, I know.) 

One of the houses in the village had a naughty and a nice list.

Whichever you chose to put your name on determined how much candy you got.

If you put your name on the "Naughty" list you got coal. 

On the nice list you got a piece of taffy!

Here is Mercedes putting her name on the "Nice" list: 

There's her name at the top! 

Miranda joined in the fun and also added her name to the nice list:

They had a little lit-up Christmas Village complete with little elves inside the houses. 

We went to see the live Nativity and ran into some livestock...literally. 

This little fella was loving the attention.

They had the same puppet show they did last year. 

Mercedes was mesmerized. 

We also learned a new little dance. 

Mercedes made a tree ornament in one of the houses and later got to add it to their town tree. 

Eventually we got hungry and stopped in to the Huntsman Hotel for some nice warm soup, breadsticks and hot chocolate.

It was delicious! 

Then we took a ride on the train. 

Gotta visit the sweet shop! 

Mercedes got to write a letter to Santa in one of the houses.

It says "Dear Santa, I want a DSI.  Love Mercedes."

(A DSI is a mini game console.)

After she wrote it she went outside to a fire pit and burned it.  The idea is that the ashes carry the letter to Santa himself.  So cute.

They had live reindeer there! 

We really enjoyed A Candlelight Christmas again this year. 

I'm glad my Aunt Opal and cousin, Josh, could make it, too! 

Merry Christmas!