A Great Ending to 2008!

Nate and I got to spend the end of the year celebrating Christmas with his family, and bringing in the New Year with our friends. I'll try to keep this post as simple as I can, but I can't make any promises.

The festivities all started on December 24th at the Durbano residence. We had a very yummy dinner that included one of every ones favorite meals... Lasagna! It was so fun to sit around eat and laugh. We then entered into a competitive round of Spoons! We decided to set the stakes higher then just the pride of beating everyone, but the ultimate winner would be exempt from any dish duty on Christmas Day. Needless to say everyone had their eyes set on the prize. After a few scratches, broken nails, and brutal battles over spoons the winner was announced... Nate! He is quite the spoon master.

After a night of fun we all retired to our own beds to await Santa's arrival. On Christmas morning Nate and I (mostly I) woke early to prepare the Christmas Hams. We decided to try two different styles of ham. One was a sugar glaze and the other was a pineapple glaze. Both equally yummy! (Note to all of you cooks out there. If you decided to try the Pineapple one use the non colored tooth picks. That way the color wont bleed.)

We then enjoyed some exchanging of gifts that ended with a crazy treasure hunt.  My mother-in-law put together a run up and down stairs, trap family members outside, and do anything you can to be the first one done treasure hunt.  It was a blast!

Soon after all of our tummies were growling and we knew it was time for the carving of the ham!  I would have to say the it was pretty close to perfect.  The only thing that could have made the day even better would have been having my family (the Buckley's) there.  They got to spend Christmas at my Britney's house in Arizona.  We missed them.

It's is amazing how things change when you get married and get older.  There is no more urge to spend New Year's Eve in some crazy place like Vegas.  The only thing that you care about is being with friends and the one you love.  We spent our night playing Mario Kart tournaments and enjoying everyone's company.  All of us had so much fun!

Nate and I are very excited to see what 2009 has in store for us.  2008 was a long but fast year. I am sure that you all understand.  The economy made the end of the year hard on a lot of people.  I would just like to say how grateful I am to have a home, job, and to be staying ahead of the economy.   

I love my family (both of them) friends, and Husband so much and can't wait to continue the memories.  Goodbye 2008 and Hello to 2009!

Temple Square

Last night we got to go to Temple Square with friends and enjoy the beautiful lights. I would highly recommend this activity! It was so Beautiful. They have spread the lights throughout all of the Church buildings there. They had lots of different nativities set up from different cultures. It was so amazing to see.

In the middle of the square where the reflection pond was they had a large nativity that encircled the pond with Mary, Joseph and Jesus in the middle of the reflection pond! I was soo pretty!

In this picture you can see the middle of the pond with the statues there.

Thanksgiving

Oh how I love the Holidays! We got to spend Thanksgiving with my whole family in Idaho. It was Great to have everyone there. Nate and I joined the family Wednesday, and with us we brought Jumbo Crab Legs and Steak, YUMMY! (For any of you who are interested in a Fantastic recipe for cooking Crab Please let me know I will pass it along!)

We then prepared ourselves for the The next day festivities! Food, Food and more Food! This is one day of the year that I can consume massive amounts of incredible food. After pies and naps we all got to hang out and enjoy everyones company, and open some Christmas presents!

We decided to play a trick on my mom by replacing the purse that we got her with golf balls. And this picture portrays here confusion of know that the box was for a purse but why was there golf balls in its place. Nate then continued to tell here that these golf balls were going to improve her golf game by extreme measures.

And here is her with her Real present! Purses are her favorite collecting items.

Ellie got a couple of DVD's from us, but not just any DVD's Scooby Doo Movies! She has a new obsession with Scooby Doo so I decided to supply here with as much Scooby as I could. She also enjoyed helping everyone open there presents as well.

Here is Nate getting a kiss from Ellie for Scooby Doo!
The Friday following Thanksgiving Rupert has a tradition that Santa comes into the Town Square and turns on all of the Christmas lights followed by fireworks! We had a ton of fun taking Ellie there to see Santa. She loved it.

We then went home and enjoyed a very competitive round of Spoons! Nate and Steve had the massive advantage know exactly how to play. My dad figured that when he accomplished his match he would capture his spoon along with scattering everyone else. It was a blast! The weekend flew by. I love being home with my family and spending time with them I can't get enough of it. I love you guys and miss you Brit and Steve!

Fall Fun!

So Nate and I have been spend a lot of time with friends and family this fall and it has been lots of fun. To kick it off we all celebrated Dougs birthday and the Timbermine Restaurant! It was a blast to spend time with the Durb's. We over ate and laughed until tears were coming up! I love them so much!

Later in October we took a trip with our friends to Las Vegas! It was so much fun! We played a few games, ate a lot of food, and listened to lots of good music! Nate and I spent an extra day there to have a little us time. It was so nice!

We went and walked through the Belagio and went into there amazing gardens! I would strongly encourage anyone heading down that way to stop. It is always amazing.

HALLOWEEN!!

This Halloween was filled with friends, food, and fun! The celebration started with a girls night at Witchapalloza! It was a play type production where these people sang and interacted with the audiance. It was very interesting, but with all of the girls there we made it worth while!

My long lost friend Amber!


One of the many fabulous costumes these witches had!

Me with all of my favorite Girls!

Then we celebrated Halloween at Pat and Nicoles house with all of our friends! Well only the married ones. No one single wanted to attend... Hard one to figure out. We did a fun Pot Luck dinner with lots of goodies! It was fun to relax and enjoy everyones company.

Nicole and Carter Chillin!

Amber, Marina, and Me!

Unfortunatley I didn't get a photo of Nate, but he really didn't dress up. Most of the guys didn't. It was a lot of fun though!

Halloween!

I like Halloween. Probably not as much as Nate, but I really enjoy the theatrics of this holiday. Just this weekend we went with a bunch of friends to dinner and a haunted house (Nightmare on 13th) before Clint heads out on his mission. In all honesty I get so scared when we do stuff like that because I am a big scared y cat and Nate loves to give me an even harder time. But by the end of things I can sit back and laugh at myself.

So throughout the Haunted house we were trying to take pictures so half of them didn't turn, and we kept getting in trouble by the security people.

Here is Clint the future missionary!

Here is the mighty Jeff Willis!

WARNING!! Long Update

Well time has been flying by here for us. I have been meaning to update my blog, but have continued to run out of time. Well enough with excuses here is what has been going on with us over the last month and a half...

We went on a Durbano family vacation to Lake Powell! For those of you who have not been there let me tell you that it is a little slice of Heaven! We had perfect weather and even better company. Unfortunately I didn't take a camera so I have been waiting for others to send me pictures. I'll post them as soon as I get them. It was a fabulous trip!

I have had two of my best friends have babies that are completely adorable! First was Nicole & Pat Burns. They had a healthy baby boy that they named Carter. He is a cutie. He has an adorable older brother Lincoln that keeps Nicole on her toes! I love to hang out with them it a lot of fun!

My best friend Jessi had her first baby boy the end of September. It was quite an event. Crew was a tough little boy to get to leave the safety of his mother! He sure is cute. He came into the world a whopping 9 lbs. 1 oz. Nate and I got to meet up with them when they came to Utah to take Crews baby pictures. We love Jessi and Grant and miss them so much!

Here's Baby Crew! And below is Jessi and I!

Nate bought me my first EVER digital camera so I have been taking lots of pictures with it in hopes of being able to blog a little more often. So if the rest seems boring that's too bad!

Nate and I have been preparing for the winter. Here are a few pictures of the latest and greatest. We went into our forest of a back yard and cut down some dead trees to serve as firewood.

Nate with the mighty Chainsaw!Here's the start of our stack of Firewood

Our dogs are growing like crazy. It has been a lot of fun playing with them. They have some of the best personalities!

Roxy has become our little escape artist! She's dug holes climbed on top of the kennel all to get out.

And after a long day of play they crash on the couch with us.

This is the first time that they have ever been in snow! And the Love it. Every time that we brought them back in they would wine to get out. Oh by the way... We got 4 inches of snow!! Crazy.