birthday boy

last tuesday was dave’s birthday, which means we are the same age for 2 weeks before i jump ahead another year. we had a lot of fun celebrating for multiple days (why just limit birthday celebrations to 1 day?!). birthday festivities included:

dinner with dave’s family on saturday night (sadly my camera never made it out of my purse), a small surprise party with a few friends and family on sunday night. thanks to cole and mindy i was able to pull off the surprise and boy was dave surprised! i thought he was going to either pee his pants or fall off our front porch step. it was so fun! i *love* surprises!

on tuesday, his real birthday, we satisfied dave’s craving for a burger and had dinner at wendy’s (you can’t beat a birthday dinner for 2 for under $10) and then headed to dave and buster’s where we played video games, killed lots of bad guys and raced cars, motorcycles and snowmobiles to our hearts content.

i am so grateful everyday i get to be married to dave. he complements me in so many ways and makes me happier than i imagined. he is a hard worker, wonderful priesthood leader and makes life so fun (seriously, i never know what’s going to come out of his mouth…he keeps me on my toes). here’s to a lifetime of celebrating!

worth the wait

i’ve been craving maggianos for over a month. thanks to a gift card we received for christmas the wait ended on monday night. it was so worth it!

perks

sometimes there are perks to my job. last night was one of those perks: free tickets to an avs game in a suite! it was quite nice (even if the avs lost)!

merry christmas and a happy new year!

i’ve decided blogging is infinitely easier (or at least less daunting) if you don’t take tons of pictures (like i did at thanksgiving). although not as much fun to look at.

christmas was wonderful (although i really don’t have any pictures to show for it). we celebrated christmas eve with my parents. we had fondue that was so good...i am in love with cheese fondue and bread (i think 3 of us ate a serving that was meant for 6 people). following dinner we read throughout the scriptures of prophecies of christ’s birth. my dad chose christmas songs sung by the mormon tabernacle choir that went with the scriptures and it was a really special night. after we got home dave and i gave each other our presents…our christmas tradition (for the second year in a row). i got dave a fly fishing rod, reel and line. he was sooo excited. he sat in our living room and practiced his casting.

 

he got me "goodnight moon," which was my favorite book when i was really little (i loved it so much i took it into the bath with me and ruined it). it was exciting to get a few things for baby wessler.

dave put one of my presents in a honey nut cheerio box. i laughed when i unwrapped it because it reminded me of when i was little and our presents were often in cereal boxes. they weren’t always wrapped, so we would be like, “who does the chex box belong to?”

we spent christmas day with dave's family. we had so much fun! the day included lots of lounging and what seemed like constant food. the picture below is dave’s dad trying to figure out if the prime rib was cooking. i thought it was too funny and i couldn’t resist taking a picture…the only one of the whole day.

i also got to take a nice nap on the world’s most comfortable couch. christmas day kicked off our 3 days of relaxing and hanging out. honestly i wore "comfy" pants for 3 days straight and it was awesome (i did shower, but then changed right back into comfy pants...2 days without jeans/real pants...that's the best). we hung out, watched “scrubs” and played games at home.

new year’s eve followed our same relaxed pattern. my brother ryan and his family came into town from nyc. we made won-tons on new year’s eve and they were delicious. 

something in the air started bothering my eyes and i decided to cool them off in the freezer (it works with onions so i thought it might help with this too). dave took advantage of the photo op of course!

 

and we introduced my mom to guitar hero. she has real potential!

this week...

dave frequently calls me at work with weekly updates on our baby...size, what's developing etc. (compliments of babycenter.com) since i can't look it up on my computer ("big brother" is watching my every move). today he left a message with the latest update. it went something like this:

"this week our baby is peeing on itself and then swimming around in it. pretty gross, but pretty funny too."

i agree!

"not so silent night" with fall out boy

2 years ago for christmas i got dave tickets to see "fall out boy." when they came back in december for the "not so silent night" concert put on by a local radio station we had to go. it was a great show. it was also reinforced to me that drunk people=stupid people.  i was really embarrassed for the people we stood next to. but after i did a little pushing and trash-talking (even though dave tried to stop me) they stayed in their own spot :)

 

jake (dave's concert buddy) and travis

this was my favorite part of the concert. during their new song, "i don't care" all the lights were off excited the body of each person's guitar was lit up. so cool!

grateful

it would be more appropriate to be posting about christmas and new year’s right now, but i never posted about thanksgiving and i need to just get it done. it has been on my to-do list for way too long and it is driving me crazy.

we headed to logan, utah to spend thanksgiving with my sister and her family. our time was mainly spent playing with the kids and sitting around talking (dave has come to realize more and more how much the todd’s love to sit around and talk when we get together). 

matt took his new atv out for a spin. the debut consisted of chasing the kids around the yard. it was pretty redneck, but definitely hilarious to watch!

as expected, it didn’t take long before uncle dave was surrounded by kids (which lasted the whole weekend).

ellie fighting dave with light sabers. this girl prefers star wars to dolls. you can tell she loves her brothers!

we got to meet our newest niece sophie. she is a doll and we couldn’t get enough of her. dave spent as much time as he could laying on the floor next to her and trying to get her to coo and smile. he was more successful than most of us.

ellie, another little girl dave adored

the boys helped grandma make turkey placeholders for each guest at thanksgiving dinner

jake with the finished product

the table...pre-lots of good food (which meant all attention had to be focused on eating...no time for taking pictures)

we were lucky enough to visit dave's sister erin and her husband john. we hit up this really cool fun center in ogden and went bowling. dave definitely showed us all up, but erin and i looked cute (that counts for something, right?!)!

we made s’mores one night in the fire pit in the backyard. there were a couple of times i thought i might get torched by a flaming marshmallow on a hanger. wild little boys around a fire definitely keep you on your toes. 

poor lexi wasn’t feeling good and missed the s’mores. so we made her one and brought it to her in bed (nothing like some graham cracker crumbs in the sheets). she loved it! dave is wrapped around her finger and she is crazy about him. we’re in major trouble if we have a little girl because dave melts around them.

the highlight of the trip was our oldest nephew spencer’s baptism. we’re so proud of the choice he made and the good example he is to his younger brother and sisters and cousins. i was lucky enough to sing at the baptism with my oldest sister angela (which doesn’t ever happen since she lives in california). sophie was also blessed at the baptism and she was a perfect angel. it was wonderful to see how the priesthood blesses us at every stage of life.   

back again!

we switched today to 9 am church for 2009 and while it is earlier, i am excited because it means sunday naps are back! i *love* sunday naps! dave and i celebrated by taking a long one. welcome back sunday naps!