2011

I have been in such the blogging mood these past few weeks but we lost our camera cord somewhere in this one bedroom apartment (you noticed i didn't say studio?  More on that to come..)you wouldn't think things could disapear in such a small space but you'd be amazed.  We have searched this place from top to bottom. Then, tonight, my brilliant husband remembered that we had another adapter thingy that we could stick our sd card in to download all the photos!  So here I am.. ready for a major update.


First.. believe it or not.. would be Christmas.
We spent Christmas here in California with the Robinson clan.  I'll be honest, I was a little bit leary of spending Christmas with Palm trees and green grass, i thought it would be a little weird, but being able to make gingerbread houses and then display them outside next to a sparkling pool and getting frozen bananas at the beach on Christmas day wasn't half bad.. just different.
We spent Christmas eve night at Jered's parents house with everyone which was way fun.. complete with a yummy dinner, games and a trip from Santa.  I wish my blog would let me post videos because Santa was pretty entertaining.. so was watching Hannah with Santa.  It was a great night and Christmas was way fun too.  There was an insane amount of presents because there were so many people and it was just nice to have everyone together all day.  Highlights included getting hooked up with presents, being able to use Christmas and went to the beach in the same day, and Teena (my sister-in-law) announcing sneakily that she was pregnant with her third baby!  We later found out that it was her third and fourth baby and that she's having twin girls!!

I took this on Christmas eve... to prove it.. we put just a tiny piece of a christmas tree by the temp.  

Our gingerbread house.. we did the house from UP.  Jered's genius idea... and his balloons were def the highlight

Smootchin on Santa.. don't tell Mrs. Clause!

Santa's reaction to seeing Santa.. priceless

Me and my nephew Matthew and niece Zhoe..love these kids

Some of the crew on the pier at Balboa Island Christmas night

NEW YEARS: We spent New Years in Utah. iT was so fun and great because it was so close to Christmas that it kind of felt like a second Christmas.  Plus more presents which was great!  My parents splurged and got us a Vitamix which is pretty much something we'll have forever.  It's one of those turbo blenders that blends everything from soups to ice cream.  It's so great.. we love it!  The whole trip was great. Just lots of family time and games and it gave me my snow fix.  It's always so great to go back to beautiful Utah. I miss everyone there!! These are the only pics I took the whole time: 

January: I honestly don't remember a lot of what happened in January.  I remember we went apartment searching a bunch, our only criterion being that it was bigger than a studio and dirt cheap without being too ghetto.  We ended up finding a great place.. pics to come.. Jered started up another semester online..poor thing.. 15 credits is a lot of time spent on the computer.  Just kind of life.. I"m sure I'd think of more exciting things if I really took the time, but for now that's all i got.  We moved out of our apartment and into out our new one on January 29th.  That was kind of a bitter-sweet day.  We were happy to have more space but we have so many great memories there. It was the perfect apartment to spend our first year. And the greatest part.. you can only go up from a studio!!  

We also had a little photo session with our beautiful niece Zhoe for her first birthday.. these are some of  

Moving: When people found our we were moving, everyone kept offering to help and bring trucks over and stuff to help but we kept saying that we were fine because we had lived in a furnished apartment and we didn't have that much stuff to move but thanks anyway.  So we started making trips one corolla-sized carfull at a time.  One of us would go over and pack up the car while the other one stayed at the new apt unpacking things.  (our new place is only like 1/2 mile away from our old one so that made it nice.. it fact. we just moved across the street from our old ward boundaries :( ) we quickly realized, however, that we had accumulated a TON more stuff over that past year than either of us realized.  It took us like 10 car loads full to get it all over here.. the equivalent of like one truck load.. ha.. but I guess we learned for next time.  It has been so fun living in a place with a bit more space and having some wall space to work with.  We've been doing a little decorating.. here are some before and afters.

Me and Hannah painting

Turns out these pictures are all really yellow, but I bought this fabric that I'm pretty much in love with on sale at Joanns and put it on canvas frames with a staple gun.  The whole thing cost like $25.

I think we need more stuff on the walls but it's a work in progress!

This is my cutest little table I found at home goods.  Again the pic is really yellow but the table is like this bright happy yellow color.  Turns out I love everything about Spring colors! Jered says our whole house looks like Easter

All of the frames and shelves we bought from Goodwill and painted.  Same with the yellow vase. The owl one i got from Home Goods for like $10 bucks. Love

I can't get these two right side up but this is just another spray painted frame with some left over fabric in it

This one is also sideways, the floral pattern is just a 12x12 sheet of paper with matting around it

This is our kitchen.  I decided to paint it green in the end and I'm glad I did.  Adds a little pop of color to an otherwise completely white kitchen. I got the canaster from Good will and the pink flowers believe it or not are from my friend Janna's wedding flowers.  Resourceful eh?

This is the whole kitchen. Just a little guy but way more space than our last place

Our little card table with a table cloth from target that I'm obsessed with.

The wall from the side.  It's still not done.  I need more stuff to give it the look i'm going for.  It's a work in progress.



Other than that we've just been keeping busy with Jered in school full time and me working full time.  Life is good. Here are a few more pics from this weekend in Santa Monica