a little more from Dwight

pine valley getaway

I may or may not be the happiest girl ever right now! Finals week is over and I survived. My schedule was tough this semester but it feels so good to be done. I am not going to school next semester since I got my associates degree this semester and I have done all my pre-requisite courses for the radiography program. Yay! I have a big break which I am thrilled about. This last week has been a rainy one in St. George which means no work for me! It has seriously been so nice. Alex and I decided we would invite some friends for a little getaway in Pine Valley this weekend and it was so nice to get out of town. We headed up on Saturday, watched the proposal had Papa Murphy's pizza then watched the Jazz game that night! We had Chris and Danica Oviatt, and Taylor and Paige Langston join us up there! We slept over and the next morning we got all ready to go to church but when we got there we saw the sign that said church was an hour earlier. oops. We headed home finished cleaning up the cabin and headed home. The trip was short and sweet but we sure do love going to Pine Valley. There was probably about a foot of snow up there and it was 27 degrees! So cold, but so fun.

NEVER get the 5 meat pizza! It is huge and weird. Just stick with the garlic chicken, its much tastier!

When Alex and I pulled into Pine Valley we headed down our street to the cabin and realized that if we pulled off the street at all that we would get stuck. We ended up tracking down the snow plow guy and I had to convince him to come plow our road for us so we could park!

Gates Family Progressive Dinner

Every Christmas season the Gates clan does a progressive dinner. Except its not really a progressive dinner, its more of a progressive party I guess. We started at my Uncle John and Aunt Michelle's house to eat popcorn and watch home videos of my dad and all his siblings when they were young. In these videos my dad is just a little baby and it is so funny to see all his siblings packing him around, dressing him up in girl clothes, make-up, and gelled hair. SO FUNNY. Seriously I love it. I also love watching the videos of my grandpa and seeing him holding and kissing his kids, i love it so much! Then we headed to my Uncle Tyler and Aunt Mary Dawn's house to sing and play Christmas music on the chimes. We are quite the musicians if i would say so myself. Next we went to Travis and Sue's for the "right family" present pass along. Alex and I were on a team and we won five bucks! We then went to my parents to decorate gingerbread cookies our family is pretty crafty ha! We ended up at my grandma's house for soup and breadsticks. It was such a fun night, we sure look forward to this party every year!

meet dwight

When we woke up December 1st, Alex and I had a little visitor in our apartment! I saw him at about 6:30 and I decided to wake Alex up haha. He wasn't very happy about getting up but I thought it was really funny and I couldn't stop laughing. Our little elf had zip-lined through the door and had made a mess of our laundry. 

The next morning our elf never came. (Probably due to overtired people who really wanted all the sleep they could get due to finals week coming up.) So when we went to bed that night our elf was waiting for us to hop in bed with him.

On the third day of December our little elf got inside the toilet paper roll and rolled his way all around the house and ended up at the foot of the tree. Since it was family night we went to Benja's for dinner and came up with a name for our family elf. We have been really into "the office" lately so we decided to name him Dwight. 

Today we found Dwight sitting on our shelf in the shower with shaving cream all over his face and Alex's razor in hand. Silly elf. 

I know Elf on the Shelf is supposed to be for little kids, but in the book it says that elf on the shelf is a family tradition, so I thought why not start this tradition our first year of being married? We love you Dwight!

we gave thanks

Our thanksgiving break was a much needed break and I am so sad to say it is over. I had big plans to study, craft, and put up Christmas over the break but the first of the three was replaced with a whole lot of family time (FT) which was just the best. Alex and I worked a ton over the break which was kind of a bummer but it was nice to get a few extra shifts in and since our coupon books are on sale at Freddy's I have been making thirty+ dollars an hour when I count in my commission. Not to shabby. The day before Thanksgiving we had dinner at my Uncle Mike and Aunt Wendy's house. Everything was so good, my grandpa pulled a few little stunts and we decided we should just be grateful to have him here while we do even though he does some crazy weird things! Then we headed to my parents house to watch the movie "Arthur Christmas." If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend it, it is one of the cutest Christmas shows! On Thanksgiving day we woke up and helped prepare food for both my family and his and then we went upstairs for the Esplin family Thanksgiving lunch! Everything was so so good and we stuffed ourselves silly. Then we went to my Grandma Gates' house for dessert and then to the movie "Rise of the Guardians," with the whole Gates clan. I actually really liked the movie, one part made me jump and Alex was totally embarrassed and mocked me the rest of the day ha. After the movie we went over to Alex's parents and Mormon Bridge. One of his cousins in Idaho even played with us over facetime! That night we decided to do a little black Friday shopping, we didn't have anything in mind to buy but we thought it would be fun just to go. We started at Wal-Mart which surprisingly was soo organized, we didn't buy anything, but it was fun anyways! Then we headed to the outlet malls where we just shopped around, filled up on hot chocolate, and had a good time. Then we went to Dick's sporting goods and we got Alex some Nike sweats and an Under Armour hoodie HALF PRICE! It was nice for me, because I was planning to get up and head to Big 5 at four AM. yes please. After Dick's we went home and went right to sleep. Alex went to Staples at 5 in the morning and I went to CAL ranch store at 6. Neither of us know what the other one bought ha but we do know what stores the other one went to. I am mostly done with Christmas now too which rocks! The next day I worked 8-5 which was super long since I was so sleepy. Then I went to my parents and worked on a Christmas banner while Alex worked! The next day I worked 8-5 again and then I met my family for dinner at PFE which was nice because Alex was able to come eat with us while he was working! Then my mom and I went to see the movie "Pitch Perfect." There was a little girl sitting next to me that LOVED to talk to me during the movie. She would say things like, "Hey, just so you know, they end up winning my mom has seen this before," or "I hope fat Amy rips her jacket off in the next song, I loved that." Then she asked me where I was from and then continued to tell me she was from Las Vegas, Nevada. Everytime I laughed, she would look over at me then bust up laughing, otherwise, the movie was pretty good. After the movie we headed over to the Boyce's for the Jazz game and OJ's by Cindy! We love you Cindy and your yummy treat! Sunday we just relaxed, we had a long week and we were tired. We had lunch at my parents house, and then my family came over to help us put up Christmas and we watched out favorite Christmas movie of all time, Christmas Vacation. It never gets old! 

Laikenn and I love chocolate pie

Our house is officially ready for Christmas, and a post is on its way... one of these days:)

i am grateful for YOU

Dear Alex,

     Lately I have been stressed out of my mind with school and work, and you have been so good to me. I love that you are always trying to make me laugh. When you start a sentence off with "I think I maybe heard one time that sometimes..." it makes me laugh no matter what the rest of the sentence is. Usually you say this when you want something from me and usually the end of the sentence is completely random and so so weird. Thanks for forcing me to go and buy Halloween/Thanksgiving decorations when I leave the Fourth of July decorations up till mid-October. You are too sweet to me, and you make all the other girls jealous. I am lucky girl. When I attempt to go for a run in the morning in shorts and a t-shirt then complain about frozen limbs and snot flowing down my face and you come home with running gear for me. You are always so thoughtful and I appreciate it a lot. Thanks for giving me blessings before my tests, I know I usually ask you the night before when I am stressed and full of tears but I know that it helps me and I am so grateful I can call on you at anytime to give me a blessing. On the rare occasion that I make dinner and/or dessert thanks for being appreciate. I know it hardly ever happens and sometimes it isn't very good, but you always eat it all and tell me how good it is. Also, thanks for never complaining about eating cereal for about 2/3 of your meals. Sometimes when I am stressed you make me go on walks with you around our apartment and you show me around like I am a tourist in my own apartment, I love these silly things we do. Thanks for working so hard. You are going to school and working too but you do so much around the house, just know it doesn't go unnoticed and your wife sure appreciates it. In a few weeks when this semester gets over I promise you will have your wife back, until then, good luck! Thanks for the last six months sweetie, they have been so great! I love and appreciate all you do! I am grateful for you Alex!

halloween {better late than never}

Since school has consumed my life this semester I am just now getting to talking about Halloween. This year Alex had class pretty much all day and I worked at the hospital. After I got off work we headed over to my Grandma Gates' house for soup, breadsticks, and white chocolate ghost suckers. What would Halloween be without those ghost suckers my grandma makes every year? She's a champ and I love that she makes so many that she has leftovers in her fridge for the next month and I can enjoy them whenever I want! After dinner we headed up to my parents house to make sugar cookies with my family! After we were done making cookies, we went to our house and had Paige and Taylor Langston, and Chris and Danica Oviatt over to watch the Jazz game. Since we live in a basement apartment we had no trick-or-treaters which made me sad. Us girls decided to paint pumpkins instead of watch the Jazz game, I started doing polka dots on my pumpkin but i pretty much ruined it so I painted it tie-dye instead. There are no pictures though because it was awful and I ended up peeling the paint off the next day ha. Even though we weren't very festive this Halloween it was still a fun one! I guess you could say I am kind of a Halloween Grinch, I hate scary things and I get scared really easy. Maybe one day when I have cute babies to dress up and take trick-or-treating I will like it, but until then I am happy to stay at home and watch the Jazz rock it. 

+

 This little Crue boy was the cutest grandpa from the movie UP, we sure love him!

 My Grandma always has a Halloween tree, and we each have an ornament with our name on it!

These two played COD after the Jazz game and they weren't very happy to have their pictures taken. oops. Oh well, Happy Halloween, even if it is 12 days late!