December 2013/ January 2014

We finished our first semester in Idaho. David made it through chemistry and his other multiple difficult fun classes. And then we wandered down to Panaca and stayed there for a week. And then we went farther south to Henderson and stayed there almost a week. And then we wandered back on up to Rexburg to start another semester. It was so lovely to relax and play with family. We managed to stop in and see all of our siblings and grandparents up and down the I-15. Unfortunately, we didn't manage to get pictures with everyone. 

 Before we left Rexburg: Snow, snow everywhere!

 

We didn't get a tree, again, but the good ol' Charlie Brown tree worked just great, again! Thanks Mom (connie) for handing that over to me a few years ago.

             

 Pictures from Panaca:

 This one picture deserves a full on story. Suffice it to say that David and Preston could not call it quits on the one-ups, and this is how it ended-- locked out! (Also, please check out David's on trend style of pants tucked in to boots. ha!)

 

Annual ice-fishin' trip where lil' Miss caught her first fish!

I thought for sure I would win this thing as I had two fish out before any of the men hooked anything. But then I had a whole lot of nothing til' the end, and by then it was too late. Papa and David: 9  Giulia: 4.  I don't remember what everybody else got. I think Zach got up to 5. (I do know that I did not come in last. But I won't mention names.)

Family Pictures!

Not many people can say that they seriously LOVE their inlaws. I am one lucky girl.

            

Spotlighting

Catchin' cats! (We weren't there for this, but David did help P set up his traps so we were pretty excited to see these pictures. Ch has a bobcat and P has a fox)

We left P-town on Sunday and headed over to Cedar City to listen to Ryan's homecoming address! It was great because we were able to catch all of the Robbins in one place. He talked about being truly converted to the Gospel. It was a great talk.

After the homecoming party we headed to Henderson where we played with some of my family and whoever from the Robbins that we could. Cough cough, no pictures. We were reallllly hoping that Shelly would have baby #4 while we there. Ah well. Also, a couple hundo later, David was able to replace the exhaust manifold on the jeep that busted on our way down. We're glad it decided to break when we were in Henderson so David had access to Grandpa's shop and tools to fix it himself.

The day before we left Nevada we stole Felicia and the kiddos from her inlaws and spent the afternoon at Chicken Shack, Ethel M's, and the airport runway watching planes take off and land.

It was such a lovely afternoon! Good company and beautiful weather! I think it was in the 60's that day. It felt so nice and got us excited about spring up north.

                     

We then started the journey back north. We stayed at Grandpa and Grandma Young's for the evening and Jenette got to come over and hang out. The next morning we went to Ikea- our first time! And then we visited with Grandmama for a bit.
By that evening we found ourselves in Logan, UT playing with this sweet thing.

It was close to her birthday and we went to the Elk Reserve to celebrate.

I've never been that close to an elk before. Very cool!  The elk are free to come and go as they please. This is just a place for them to winter so they don't go down the canyon and get hit by a car or destroy lawns, meet a tragic end, etc. One of the elk they had tagged came in from Jackson, WY. I never realized that these guys move so far!

Big horsies!

This was a poster in the window of the visitor's center. It made me giggle! It says, "Catch 'em, keep 'em. Well, maybe it's little more complicated than that, but research shows that people who fish are more successful in relationships. Fishing licenses make great holiday gifts!" Harharhar.

We made it back to Rexburg and started the winter semester two days later. We're both just under 12 credits- it's our off semester and we grabbed as many classes as we could. It's nice not being as stressed and busy as last semester when we were both taking 15 credits. We're so not stressed that we've had time to finally put the trim up around the hall closet doors, and we also put up the decorative trim around my cute little command center. 

And we've had time to decorate a little. This little house is becoming our home.

And baby Wyatt finally arrived! This is nephew #6 for us. We can't wait to meet him!

That pretty much covers us through January. 

Happy New Year! and Happy 4 year anniversary! 

2013 was a good year filled with a lot of highs and enough lows to keep us balanced. :) I don't really intend to make our lives look rosy and perfect, but I just realized that I do tend to only write about the fun things that we did/happened. I'm a good forgetter and easily forget about the fun times we had if I don't have pictures of it. I'm also good at forgetting the reasons why I get upset- this is great for David. ;) And pictures don't generally get taken at particularly sad moments. And what I have pictures of is generally what I put on here in order for us to keep a family photo album. So, keep in mind all five of you readers out there: our life isn't rosy all the time, nor some of the time. It's full of early mornings and late nights working (on school or at work) and worrying about x,y,z. But at the end of the day, we choose to be happy. And that's what we'll continue to do and share here: happiness. 

Bring on 2014!