happy new year!

Sorry for the delay! Here is what you've been waiting for! Now your life can go back to the norm!

We drove home Thursday, December 13th after Matt's last final. Don't worry, he practically aced all of his exams, whatta smarty pants! On Friday night we went to Jenny & Jimmy's Christmas party and had an awesome time reconnecting with old friends from college. Mom and Dad babysat Bentley and Trace's kids too.

Saturday the 14th we went to my parent's ward Christmas party. How I ended up on Santa's lap I have no idea, the poor man! Santa was more afraid of Bentley than Bentley was afraid of him. He was worried Bentley would cry and pull off his beard.

Christmas Eve. We took Bentley and Luke to Salt Creek Beach. They both snacked on some tasty rocks covered in sand. We went to dinner with Mom and Dad, Trace's family Janni, Marvin and Luke at Maggiano's. Then we went back home and the kids each opened a gift and played "find the pickle" and read the nativity story. The kids all got new pajamas to sleep in while they waited for Santa. And each of our families got an awesome camcorder from Mom and Dad.

Opening presents was a lot of work. This is how Bentley slept during his afternoon nap on Christmas, probably dreaming about all of the wonderful paper, bows and boxes that he gets to play with when he wakes up. He and Luke had fun playing with all of their toys and their wrappings. Grandad picked out the new Elmo that sings "Elmo loves you so so much" and his eyes light up with hearts. In the afternoon Trace's family came over and opened their presents and we had an early dinner.

After dinner we drove out to Temecula to spend Christmas night with Matt's family. It was well worth the drive to see Matt's nephew Mike that we haven't seen in a few years. Mike left for Iraq a couple of days ago. He is a marine and will be working on the humvies and other vehicles for the next 13 months. Bentley loved him and thought he was hilarious.

We made a post Christmas trip to I Love Bagels with Michelle and Shannon. The boys thouroughly enjoyed bagels and Cheerios.

And Wednesday afternoon we drove Marvin into LA to fly home to Utah. We spent a few hours at our apartment so that Mandy could see Luke and play with both of the babies. They were kind of cranky and we didn't realize until the next morning that they each had a new tooth. Bentley now has 2 bottom teeth.

And we got to hang out with Brian, Jane, Linz, Seth, and Shannon at Beach Cities Pizza. Oh the memories of breadsticks dancing in our heads!



And on New Year's Eve we went to lunch with the Glausers at Wahoo's and then hung out at Aliso Creek Beach in Laguna. Why does it seem that there is always food involved?