Christmas part-TAYs

Chase and I have had a busy few days! But it was the super FUN kinda busy! :D


Friday night we got to get all dressed up (I love to dress up!) and went to the 3form architecture Christmas party at The Melting Pot! After we FINALLY parked, it was pretty fun. We got to know Chuck and his wife a bit better and we ate some DELISH chocolate! (there were other courses but they definitely ended with the best!)

Saturday Chases cousin Josh came into town to do some top secret shopping for a top secret gift...teehee! and I got to clean up the apartment and hang out in the morning (which I love almost as much as getting dressed up) and then I got to go to a fun women's fellowship 'Christmas Cheesecake & Chat' celebration at church!  We had a bunch of different kinds of cheesecake (bite sized pieces so you could try as many different kinds as possible withOUT throwing up) and they also had a bunch of donated prizes to raffle off! Okay, there were about 65 women and about 30 gifts and there were 6 of us at my table...ALL 6 of us won a prize! And my friend, Laurie and her mother, Legoria, kept getting their tickets pulled!! I think each of them had their tickets called maybe 4 or 5 times BUT, being the gracious women they are, they only took two of the prizes haha! I ended up winning a big scrapbooking kit!! I think it's a sign from God that I should definitely keep going with the honeymoon scrapbook! :D


Later that night, after much cheesecake clean up, Chase and I went over to Laurie and Keith's house to exchange Christmas gifts, go to dinner and make gingerbread houses! It was a blast! As most of you know though, Chase and I are a little...well, different.  Just keep that in mind as you look at the gingerbread houses. :)

Chase got a universal remote

(we can now watch DVDs in the bedroom and we can use it to watch netflix on the xbox!!!)

We made laurie a photo book and got her a couple of cheapo DVDs from the gas station, of all places!

(if you look closely you can still see the price tag on them...)

I got this absolutely perfect hair straightener with heat protectant spray stuff to protect my hair from the heat (get it?) It's perfect because I stepped on and broke my other straightener which still wasn't nearly as nice as this one! You'd have to step on this one a couple of times to bust it!

Keith got a CD and a calendar!

Here is Chase, trying to keep it together.

Cute mistletoe!

we warned him...poor little gingerbread man

The Gunnersons' cute little snowman

The Nortons' cute little cheiftan

Sunday we got to celebrate Christmas with the Gregorys, since we will be in price for Christmas (our first MARRIED Christmas!)  :)  We went to my parents' house after Church and we got to open our stockings (my mom does a mean stocking!) Then my mom made us a wonderful Ham lunch/dinner and then we opened the rest of our presents.  THEN we all went to see Avatar!!! And it was pretty dang good.  Everyone in my family enjoyed it and let me tell you, the guys in my family are a bunch of critics! :)  It was a very nice day!

all of our stocking loot! :)

My brothers' idea of setting the table! HA!

           

The Nortons first married Christmas 2009! :)

                                   

It was a grrrrrrrrrreat weekend! And THIS weekend we are in Price with the Nortons! Can't wait!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Bad As Mountain Bikers

Some of you may be wondering what happened with our stolen bikes. WEEELLLL, we were able to get Chases bike last week! YAYAYAYAY!!!  After MUCH MUCH MUCH searching and researching Chase decided on the Specialized Pitch Pro. :)

We will be picking mine up sometime this week. Mine is the Specialized Myka! It's a women's bike and it has butterflies on it. :) Here is a picture.

ooooooooooooo! ahhhhhhhhhhh!


Chase is also getting a helmet cam! His last one was destroyed when he got hit by a car. I'll have to upload some videos once it gets warm and we start mountain biking! :D I already have some rockin' gloves!

O Christmas Crumb

Have mentioned how adorable I think my beardie is???? Well, here is proof!

He was sitting on Chases chest, with the Christmas tree right next to him and he just leaped from Chase to the tree and fell asleep!! :D If THAT'S not cute, I dunno what is!  He does it all the time.  He will climb so deep in the tree that we can't even see him sometimes! he just snuggles in and falls asleep.  haha! LOVE IT! It must make him feel safe or be warm or something. One things for sure...IT'S CUTE!

Here is another crazy pose from crumb! I really think he is modeling for me! :)

By the way, his spikes are getting SO big!!! He had a big shed this week and we watched a video of him when we first got him...he has grown SOOOOOO INCREDIBLY MUCH!  :D

filthy bike theifs!

This past Saturday, when I was getting the vacuum from the storage closet on the balcony, I noticed there were no bikes on the balcony.  Strange, since we have 3 bikes between us.  I remembered mine was at my parents' house (thankfully) and I figured Chase has also left his at someone's house or maybe one was in the trunk or something.  Anyway, I didn't think much of it until later that night when I asked "Chase, where are your bikes?" and he replied "On the balcony."  This is the part where I panick.  I say "No they're not..." and he says, jumping up from his comfortable napping position on the couch "WHAT?!" and I open the door to the balcony and we both see the bad news.  The bikes are gone. GONE GONE GONE! 

That's right! Chases bikes got stolen right off of our balcony!!  No, they were not locked up, which, in hindsight, was pretty stupid BUT if you saw where our balcony was you wouldn't have thought we were TOO stupid!  It's on the second floor and there is brick on either side of it and it's not as if it faces a parking lot or a street or neighborhood.  It faces the jordan river trail!  Maybe 5 people a week pass it!!  Someone must have really wanted them to scale up our apartment wall somehow and then toss the bikes down and climb back down and take them away in the snow.  Honestly, with a theif that determined I don't know that locks would have stopped them!  So, that stinks harcore.

BUT we DO have renters insurance (thank the Lord) and we spoke with them and they are going to cover it.  We are waiting 2 business days to hear back from the claims department on exactly how much we will get and how all that works.  Chase will probably just take whatever he gets and put it towards just a mountain bike.  He had a mountain bike and a road bike both stolen but he uses his mountain bike more often.  Thankfully my bike was at my parents' house.  That's good because I love having a bike but I don't think I would spend money to get a new one...

We are pretty dissapointed they were stolen though, we really never thought anyone would bother.  I guess we are too trusting.  But we've learned our lesson.  We'll probably just keep the bike in the house now. (Thanks stupid bike theif) 

Chase said he hopes the bikes made the bike theif's life better.  We are hoping he needed then for money for food to feed his family or something!

Wherever you are bike theif, I hope you're happy...

Rockin' around the Christmas tree!

I FINALLY got to decorate our apartment for Christmas!  HUZZAH!  And, might I say, it IS B-E-A-UTIFUL! AND it snowed which normally I loathe but, surprisingly, I really missed it.  I was surprised at how much the lack of snow dampened my Christmas spirit.  But now my lights are up and my half-tree is up and it's snowing just enough and everything is as it should be!


My mom actually gave us a lot of decorations but I was going to wal-mart


Let me tell YOU though, getting these Christmas decorations was NOT easy.  (my mom actually gave us a lot of decorations but I had to go grocery shopping anyway and I kind of wanted to buy our own too.)  I had to work for them!  Because I left it until December to get them and I went to Wal-mart...well...you can guess what Wal-mart was like on a Saturday afternoon in December. Absolutely frightening!  Rember when I said something about everyone being nicer because it's the holiday season?  Well, I meant AFTER they had their Christmas shopping done!  WHILE they're Christmas shopping they are NUTS, myself included!  Cart bashing, rude mumbling, stink eyes.  That was my Saturday afternoon. *sigh* BUT it was all worth it!  It's all done now and I LOVE walking into my cheery, warm apartment after a long day at work. :D


Here are some pictures!

My mom had this littl 3footer sitting around so she gave it to us and it fits perfectly in our shoebox apartment!  I had A TON of Christmas tree decorations that my mom gave us but this lil' guy really didn't need much. haha!

My very first Christmas ornament!

our very first nativity scene as a married couple. (my mom gave it to us)

This was a wedding gift. :) Kind of our first-year-married ornament. Thanks Gregg & Cheryl (who will never read this but I thank them anyway!)

here are some pictures of our advent calendars from my mom! A chocolate every day until Christmas!!! (Chase says he is saving his up to eat them all on Christmas lol)

Olivia Fay Norton

I don't think I ever posted a blog about my one and only niece, Olivia! I know I've told everyone about her but here but she is SOOOOO cute she deserves a blog.  These are the most recent pictures of her, just taken last night!  She is almost 2 months old. She is smiling and wiggling and kicking and everything! It's so exciting! :D