New Year's in San Diego

We were able to spend a whole week in San Diego with my family for New Year's!! My entire family was there and it was so much fun to see everyone:) It had been way too long since we had seen some of them! For New Year's Eve the adults went out to dinner and to the play, "It's A Wonderful Life." And then we went back home to put the kids to bed and celebrate. We were all pretty tired, but most of us managed to stay up until midnight:) While we were there we also managed to have our usual beach trip, filled with sand sledding and smores:) This has become a really fun tradition for the Romney family! My mom also held one of her famous tea parties with the grand-kids, while the adults went to see Avatar. Thank you Mimi for teaching our children such impeccable manners! Thanks Mimi and Papa for such a fun trip:)

A Texas Christmas

Christmas was a lot of fun this year! We spent Christmas Eve at a friends house for dinner and then came home and acted out the Christmas story (Lexi was a very uncooperative baby Jesus), opened our pj's from Mimi and Papa while they watched on the web cam and then sent the girls off to bed so that we could await Santa's arrival. Jed an I stayed up until 1am watching "It's A Wonderful Life!" I just love this show:) Christmas morning was very relaxing. We slept in until 8am and then opened our gifts while Grandpa Tim and Grandma Lori were watching through the web cam - thank goodness for modern technology:) Santa brought Olivia a razor scooter and a guitar and he brought Lexi a tree tent, and a rocking horse! Lexi was scared of most of her presents in the beginning and was completely content with the wrapping paper and bows! She has since discovered though that she is in love with Elmo:) I think we watch it almost every day! That afternoon we went to the Biorns house for an amazing BBQ brisket dinner - it was so yummy:) We actually spent Thanksgiving and Christmas with the Biorns this year! They have truley become part of our family - as so many of our friends here have:)

Gingerbread Houses

On another December night we went over to the Biorns house with some of our friends and decorated Graham cracker Gingerbread houses! Olivia decided that she was going to just decorate the front yard of her house - the actual house was in her imagination - it was definitely very unique:) And of course Jed had to show his artistic skills with his little Gingerbread house:) It was pretty cute! Later that night, we found the younger kids upstairs relaxing and watching "The Grinch" - it can't be Christmas without the Grinch - it's Olivia's favorite movie:)

December Fun

During the month of December we had a lot of fun with our friends, celebrating the Holidays!! One Saturday we decided to take a trip to the Bass Pro Shop where they were having all kinds of fun Christmas activities for the kids. Little did we know that after an hour long drive, the activities consisted of decorating broken sugar cookies, and having to stand in line for 3 hours to take a picture with Santa:( So we decorated the cookies, took our own pictures around the Holiday decorations and on some ATV's, toured around the rest of the store (it was pretty cool) and then headed out for dinner! Once we got passed all of the disappointments, it turned out to be a pretty fun day:)

"Bedtime Stories"

Olivia had a wonderful music teacher at school this year (mom you would love her) and she put together an amazing Christmas performance. They sang songs, told stories and all of the kids had an opportunity to play instruments too! Olivia also had a fun Christmas play in her class that we were able to attend along with her Christmas party!!

Jed turned 30!!!!

On December 15, 2009, my amazing husband turned 30!!!! He didn't want me to make a big deal about it so we just had a quiet night at our house with his favorite dinner and cake and some presents. Plus, he and my dad and brothers had already had a big celebration with a boys weekend in Park City, along with the BYU game in September (my brother was also celebrating his 30th birthday)!! I did come home late one night from mutual though, only to find him watching all of his high school basketball, football, and rodeo videos (aren't they supposed to have their mid-life crisis at 40? He still has a few years:)

New Moon

Some friends and I took advantage of a Friday night off from our families and went to dinner (yes, Chuy's again) and then went to see "New Moon," to help celebrate Monique and Kristina's birthdays in November. It was so much fun and I must say that I may be a Jacob fan now:)

Halloween

We had such a fun Halloween in 2009!! We couldn't believe that we had to actually wear t-shirts instead of snow clothes though and we had a really fun filled day with our friends!! We started out by going to our favorite restaurant, Chuy's, then on to the Ward trunk-or-treat and then ended the evening with more trick-or-treating on base (courtesy of the Biorns:)
Olivia was Cinderella at school and then she wanted to be a scary witch with a green face for trick-or-treating. Lexi was an adorable ladybug (thanks Mimi for the costume)!! I know I'm biased - but really - could she get any cuter? (if you were wondering - I was an angel) We have such incredible friends here that make being away from family a little more bearable!
The only bad thing about Halloween? Waking up the next day to 15 bug bites all over Olivia's legs - gotta love the bugs in Texas!