If you’re new around these parts, this monthly series is an exercise in brevity as I try (sometimes not very hard) to summarize each day of our month in one sentence. (Also, I’ve been taking a picture of my daughter every day since she was born, and this is a GREAT place for me to share several of those!). Although I’ve almost always included the photo at the top of its corresponding day, the daily captions of what we did and the photos often do not match. (Just to clarify!)
Thanks to the wonderful Rebecca Jo for the post idea!
Friday 12/1 – Attended our first ward Christmas party since moving here to the house. We’re slowly but surely getting to know more and more of our neighbors, and this party was a good chance to meet a few more. We did have to jet out pretty early, however, as my first trimester pregnancy symptoms started rearing their ugly heads after about an hour.
Saturday 12/2 – Drove down to Salt Lake for my family’s annual extended family Christmas party, which was surprisingly sparse this year, due to a lot of family members having prior engagements. I ended up announcing my pregnancy to the family at large, but it turns out that most people had already had their suspicions, so it wasn’t exactly the surprise we intended. Matt and I meant to take Raven to see the Christmas lights on Temple Square after, but it totally slipped our minds when we got sidetracked visiting with Matt’s folks on our way back home.
Sunday 12/3 – Went and celebrated our friends’ baby’s first birthday party, which was super fun for Raven as he’s one of her favorite little buddies. (Also, it was a bit wild for us to reminisce about the birth since I was there for it all!). After, we drove home through the first heavy(ish) snowstorm of the year.
Monday 12/4 – Although we got our tree up last week, it took me until this Monday to get the rest of our decor up, which includes an ever-growing collection of several nativities and a new (to us) Christmas wreath from my mom. I never thought about how living in a home would make decorating for the holidays more fun (even though we basically have all the same decorations as before and put forth the same effort in getting everything set up). We’re waiting to buy lights for the outside of the house until after Christmas this year (wanna hit some of those killer clearance sales!), so Matt lucked out on not needing to put those up this year.
Tuesday 12/5 – I basically got all my Christmas shopping done on this day (mostly online, but Raven and I did hit one store in the morning), which has got to be some kind of record for me, as I’m more often than not still getting last-minute gifts around the 22nd or so. A Christmas miracle!
Wednesday 12/6 – Matt, being the scoutmaster, had his monthly pack meeting, so I was on my own with bedtime. Luckily for me, he got home just in time for me to make it just a couple minutes late to my exercise class.
Thursday 12/7 – Finally, a night of no responsibility! We spent it following the schedule as closely as possible and lounging in front of the t.v. the rest of the night. Ah, relaxation.
Friday 12/8 – Decided (after going back and forth all week on whether we wanted to or not) to drive down to Salt Lake after Matt got off work to go see the lights at Temple Square (since Raven had never seen them) and to go have her decorate cookies with the other grandkids at my mom and stepdad’s house. A late night, but a fun one!
Saturday 12/9 – A super full day, with a photo shoot I did in the morning, watching our nephew in the afternoon, and having a fun dinner and game night with one of my closest childhood friends and her husband, who we don’t see nearly often enough. Another late night, but a fun one, too! (Are you sensing a trend, here?)
Sunday 12/10 – Dealt with some meltdowns/toddler tantrums/frustrating potty incidents after church today, which we’ll blame on the crazy schedule of the past two days. And of course, being gluttons for punishment, we stayed out kind of late (again) to attend our stake’s choirside so we could sing with our ward’s choir, which we’ve been practicing with for weeks now. Despite the later hour, it was the peaceful end we needed to what had been kind of a stressful parenting day!
Monday 12/11 – Raven got jingle bells when we went to storytime at the library, and we sang the song by the same name basically all day long.
Tuesday 12/12 – I had offered to take in dinner to a friend of mine since she had surgery on this day, so this was the first time I had really cooked anything in almost my whole pregnancy (or at least since I started feeling sick). Matt rejoiced.
Wednesday 12/13 – Raven and I had the exciting duty in the morning of getting to go and get the windshield replaced in our car (which is up for registration this month, so we couldn’t put it off any longer, as it had two massive cracks across the whole thing). Luckily, the place we went to (Logan Glass) was AWESOME and honored a discount I heard about on the radio (though I was about a week late in asking about it), which saved us around $40 (plus the additional $30 I had already saved from an online deal). Since the receptionist offered to put on cartoons for Raven while we waited, I actually got in some decent reading time. Love places with great customer service!
Thursday 12/14 – Raven and I went visiting teaching early in the morning and got home just in time for our big new Christmas present to arrive—a brand new couch! It looks great in the space, but it would have looked even better had we been able to get rid of the old couch beforehand (the old couch sat right in front of the new couch for about a week before I begged Matt to take it out to the garage, and another week after that before someone came and got it! You can see the old couch in the picture above and below still.)
Friday 12/15 – We went to Matt’s work party–a steak dinner out at Copper Mill and a white elephant gift exchange–and didn’t embarrass ourselves nearly as much as last year, when Matt spilled a drink all over his boss’s lap, and I forgot basic family relationships, like the fact that one of his bosses and his wife shared the same kids. Also, we decided to announce to them on the spur of the moment that I was pregnant (because it turns out that his coworker was too and the timing was just too perfect to not slip it in there), and it was easily the best reaction we’ve had to the news so far. Good times.
Saturday 12/16 – We had our monthly get-together with our friends, and rather than going with the usual Christmas-time fare, we bucked tradition and had an Indian-themed early dinner (DELICIOUS!). Even my sensitive pregnant stomach enjoyed it! (We also announced our pregnancy to these friends that day. It’s always such a relief to finally just tell people!)
Sunday 12/17 – After church (in which Matt and I sang a duet for the congregation of O Holy Night, with both of us singing tenor), we drove down south to spend the afternoon at my immediate family’s Christmas party, where we enjoyed a ham feast and fun games (my mom always comes up with the best group games for this event). Although we didn’t score the biggest prizes, we still had a great time!
Monday 12/18 – Raven and I wore ourselves out in the morning with storytime at the library (the last one of the year), lunch at Sam’s Club and then grocery shopping right after, and then we both zonked for about two and a half hours. Later for family night, we showed Raven how to make paper snowflakes for the first time, and she was duly impressed(ish).
Tuesday 12/19 – After looking forward to our second ultrasound for weeks, Raven and I were both throwing up in the morning thanks to yet another horrific stomach bug, and I was worried about making it through the appointment. Well, I needn’t have worried for myself—turns out, it was Matt that got bit by the bug and was throwing up right there in the exam room, followed up with more vomiting out the window as he drove home. A memorable ultrasound for sure, but we were super happy that everything looked okay and that we were able to announce the pregnancy to the world finally! (Matt, coincidentally, took the rest the day off of work.)
Wednesday 12/20 – I still was feeling slightly off, so I took it waaaay easy, even skipping out on my exercise class. Matt, being the champ he is, somehow managed to feel well enough to go into work AND take Raven out to shovel snow and teach her how to make snow angels (adorable).
Thursday 12/21 – I was asked to help out with some of the special musical numbers for our Christmas service on Sunday, so I went to a rehearsal to practice it all before the big day. Matt spent most of the evening wrapping presents (I’d already done mine), and when I got back from my rehearsal, I happily watched Psych as he taped away.
Friday 12/22 – My mom and stepdad were up in our area because of a funeral, so they came by the house afterwards and cleaned our whole kitchen for us while we waited for Matt to get off of work (since this pregnancy has meant that I have been AWFUL at keeping up on housework). Afterwards, we all tried a new-to-us pizza place (Fredrico’s), which we’re definitely going to have to return to!
Saturday 12/23 – We celebrated Christmas early at our place (as we always do), and this was the first year Raven started to get the whole Santa concept. She came into our room early and asked me, “Santa came in the night? Santa left me toys?” Basically, the whole thing was awesome, and I almost cried like the hormonal mama I am because I just loved seeing her so excited and happy over everything. Later, we all took a trip up to Hardware Ranch to go on a “sleigh ride” to see the elk up there. It was bitterly cold, but overall SUCH a great day!
Sunday 12/24 – We had a special church service (only an hour long!), where Matt and I participated by singing in the choir, and I ended up accompanying several of the songs for both the choir and congregation. After, we drove down to my in-laws’ house for Matt’s big extended family Christmas party, which was a wild and chaotic and loud four hours of family and fun and food, complete with the usual massive White Elephant gift exchange. Afterwards, his immediate family stuck around so we could do part of our own sibling gift exchange.
Monday 12/25 – Christmas day! We woke up at my mom and stepdad’s house to an awesome breakfast of cinnamon rolls, scrambled eggs, and bacon, then Raven opened up her gifts from them. Later, we went back to Matt’s folks’ house for more gift exchanges there, then came back again to my mom and stepdad’s place to see my siblings and have (yet) more food/lunch. After such a busy and FULL two days, it was sure nice to get back into the quiet of our own home and go to bed early!
Tuesday 12/26 – The stomach flu somehow seemed to hit us AGAIN, and Raven very unexpectedly threw up in the late afternoon, right after I’d spent about an hour catching up with my good friends the Majors, who had come up for the afternoon to check out Hardware Ranch for themselves. Matt and I spent the rest of the evening feeling like an axe was hanging over our heads, but–knock on wood–both of us seemed to escape this particular bout.
Wednesday 12/27 – I was still nervous about getting sick, so I didn’t dare venture to leave the house in the morning, as we often do. It ended up being a great thing because it finally meant that Raven had a chance to check out the Play Dough she’d gotten in her stocking, and she spent a focused TWO HOURS playing with the stuff on the kitchen table. That kid has got some major concentration, man.
Thursday 12/28 – Went to my first community Refit class, which is reminiscent of Zumba (but free and a LOT closer to our new house!). I was pleasantly surprised that I liked it nearly as much as I like my weekly hip hop class, which is saying something.
Friday 12/29 – Spent most of the night getting ready and packing for our weekend away (but please admire this picture above, where I caught Raven throwing not just one, but TWO things into the air while jumping).
Saturday 12/30 – Drove down to my stepgrandma’s in the morning for her annual Christmas party and then traveled the three and a half hours from there down to St. George to spend the weekend with Matt’s family, as his parents had rented out condos for everyone for my nephew’s baptism. Since we didn’t get there until later in the evening (like around 6:30), we basically just had time to eat dinner before we put Raven to bed, but it was nice to have the excuse myself to go to bed super early (around 9–a record!).
Sunday 12/31 – Since my nephew and his family’s church meetings didn’t start until one, we went to Snow Canyon for a couple hours in the morning to glory in the feel of sunshine against our faces and temperatures that didn’t leave us screaming to get back inside (at one point, I even shed my jacket!). After church, we actually went back to the canyon so the kids could play on the sand dunes, and it was just so REFRESHING to be outside again (we obviously haven’t spent much time out since it’s been so cold). For a ridiculous number of pics taken at the canyon, check out this post. I tried to stay up as late as I could to bring in the new year, but I didn’t even make it until ten, though I did have a killer time enjoying the steak dinner my mother-in-law had prepared and playing Pick Up Sticks, which I had actually never played before (and also watching Matt and his family play this hilarious game–pictured above–that I’m blanking on the name at the moment. Basically just imagine playing a game like Mad Gab while wearing a tooth whitening tray, and you get the idea).
And after that INSANELY busy December, our 2017 was a wrap! Hope you all had a wonderful holiday season!
