Merry December and Christmas!

Ugly sweater party!

Our Christmas decorations and out tree!

Our new book case!

J's birthday present from his sister!

The homemade newspaper bow I made!

Christmas Eve in our Christmas Jammies!

I want this for Christmas!

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Christmas.

This evening I am preparing a lesson that I have to teach in Young Womens on Sunday. While preparing I watched the 2010 First Presidency Christmas Devotional I missed it when it was on TV and I figured it would help me with my lesson, since I am teaching the Christmas lesson. If you missed it, go to LDS.org and watch it. It is amazing. With only watching the talks its only about 30 mins. Speaking of LDS.org the new website is pretty cool. They even have a Christmas website Christmas.lds.org

Remember the REASON FOR THE SEASON as it comes upon us so fast this year.

Major Catch Up

Josh and I got to go to Hawaii in October. Josh was teaching a class and he flew out on Sunday, I flew out on Tuesday. This was the first time I have ever flown alone. I was scared to death. Not only did I have to fly by myself I had to carry on a rebreather, which TSA always thinks it a bomb, and I had 3 carry ons (long story) but no one even said anything about having 3 carry ons. It is a 6 hour flight from Salt Lake to Honolulu and I get antsy on the 3 hour flight to Atlanta. I was prepared with a portable dvd player, the 1st season of project runway, a new book and YW projects to work on. The flight wasn't near as long as I thought it would be, I watched some project runway and finally when I got my personal TV on the back on the seat in front of me to work, I watched the new Twilight movie. Once I got to Honolulu I had a 4 hour layover before I flew to Lana'i. I ate some marvelous coconut shrimp, worked on my computer a little and walked around some of the shops but my arms felt like they were going to fall off so I went to find my Island Air terminal. The Island Air flight from Honolulu to Lana'i was only 30 mins but it was definitely the worst flight I have ever been on. A tiny, crowded, stinky plane that was way loud and bumpy and shaky. But we landed safely and finally I was in Hawaii with my Husband!

Here are lots of pictures!

I got to spend one day at the 4 seasons resort, It was marvelous.

Fish eyes

Our hike on the Munro Trail

The place we stayed

My favorite tree ever, I wish I could have taken it home.

Halloween 2010!

Josh and I were having a hard time decided what to be for Halloween this year, but Josh's sister invited us to a 1920's theme murder mystery party the Friday before Halloween, So we decided that I would make a flapper-ish dress for me and Josh would be a 1920's mobster, this gave him the excuse to buy a holster he has been wanting for a long time (he did get a great deal on it).

The party was so much fun my sister in law did an awesome job putting it all together. I was Mary Toosteal and Josh was Congressman Darrin Toosteal, well at is who his second character was. He was the original victim "Big Jim". Josh got killed twice during the party, I actually paid someone to kill him the 2nd time :)

Check out all the pictures here

On Saturday we got together with my family. We went to Collette's house, the kids went trick or treating together and then we had pizza. Since my mom passed away all of us kids started a tradition of getting together on Halloween for dinner, we have lots of fun. The Christiansen's were home with the flu this year :(

Batman, Wonder Woman, a Witch and a Vampire!

Tinkerbell, Minnie Mouse and Rambo!

It was a very fun Halloween weekend.

Holy tomatoes!

I got all these tomatoes from work, one of the residents family members brought them from their garden but we aren't allowed to serve them to the residents. The cook asked if I wanted some and I said that I would take a few, she gave all of them to me. I don't even like tomatoes! A few months ago Josh brought home this 'make your own salsa' pack. I decided that now would be the perfect time to make salsa. Why did I choose Friday evening? I don't know, it's not like I had nothing better to do. I could of been cleaning my house or making dinner or watching the guy fix my AC or finishing the YW oct calendar or get caught up on project runway or working on a project for work that I should of finished a few months ago or organizing one of my 3 closets that need organizing or crafting or planning/making my Halloween costume. I had plenty of things I could of been doing.

First I had to scald the tomatoes for 3 minutes in boiling water then put them in cold water. After that I had to core them, peel them and chop them up. While doing this to the first one is when I thought 'what did I get myself into?' i used to help my mom make salsa but she knew what she was doing and would just tell me what to do. I forgot how tomato juice makes your skin itch and burn.

Look at all those tomato guts!

My sister Collette was making salsa too so she offered to seal my cans for me, since I didn't want to do that my self. I ended up with 3 1/2 cans of salsa. I only canned 3 then left the rest out for Josh and I to eat now! I was pretty proud of my 3 cans of salsa until I saw Collette 15+ jars. I still am proud of my domestic-ness!