2010 in Review

Here is my year in review:

February - I fly to Seattle for my first wedding shower.

March - Joe receives his Bachelor's Degree.

March - Gown shopping with my mom and I purchase my dream wedding gown.

March - First trip into Boston.

May - A trip into Maine.

May - My 29th birthday celebrated with a trip to New York City.

June - Our final trip into Mystic, Connecticut.

June - Joe's 40th birthday, a surprise visit from Cindy and Samantha, and Fenway Park!

June - Another trip into New York City (continuing Joe's birthday celebration).

July - Walking the National Mall with the dogs.

July - Last night out with friends in Washington D.C.

July - We start our cross-country move back to Seattle, with a stop in Chicago.

July - During out trip through Yellowstone, we see a bear and her cubs.

August - My neice gets married!

August - I start a new job where I can bring Ava to work.


September - We get our marraige license!

September - My cousin throws us another shower.

September - Joe's family throws us a wedding shower.

October - We get married!!!

October - We take an amazing, relaxing honeymoon to Cancun.

October - My cousin gets married.

November - We meet my cousin's new dog Bogey for the first time during Thanksgiving.

December - We celebrated our first Christmas as a married couple!

It has literally been the most amazing year! I have never been happier and am so happy with all the fun adventures we've been able to experience in 2010. I know it will be a hard year to beat, but I already know that 2011 will be amazing as well.

I hope you all are as happy with your 2010 as I am with mine!

Christmas Day

Joe and I really wanted to keep our tradition of having our own special Christmas morning with just our family of four. So, Christmas morning we woke up in the room we were staying in at Joe's parent's house, got some coffee, and settled in for our little gift exchange.

First, we took down our stockings.

(I had to hang them up the night before.)

Then the dogs got to open their gifts. Well, actually, Jackson opened both gifts while Ava watched from the warmth of the blanket on my lap.

Jackson playing with his new Christmas raccoon.

Then we opened the gifts from each other.

You can still see Ava sleeping in my lap - that's my girl!

Joe has been begging me for the movie "Shooter" for months.

Yay! The new S.K. book!

mmmm... Beckham. :)

I loved our little private Christmas morning. I don't have any pictures from the rest of the day, but we had another nice relaxing day with family. We headed over to Joe's aunt's house for lunch and hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps. After lunch we went back to Joe's parent's and a few other family members stopped by to catch up. It was nice.

Low-key, that was our Christmas. And it's just what we needed.

Christmas Eve Festivities

I can't believe it's New Year's Eve already! I've really been lazy between Christmas and now! So be prepared for a few posts today, so I can get caught up before 2011 begins.

We spent Christmas with Joe's family in Portland. It was a nice relaxing weekend with family.

On Christmas Eve, we invited our friends over so we could give gifts to their kids. One of their little girls, Marleigh, was the flower girl at our wedding. We were really happy to see them during the holiday, even though everyone was so busy.

Marleigh and McKenna

Zander as the center of attention. :)

Zander opening his gift - a dump truck. (Joe almost kept it for himself he liked playing with it so much. I suppose all men are just big boys at heart, huh?)

Marleigh and me.

After we visited with them for a bit, it was time to head over to Joe's sister and brother-in-law's house for Christmas Eve dinner. This is one of the things that Joe has missed the most since we moved away - his brother-in-law's cooking!

Cindy and Shane with the famous prime rib.

Family getting ready for dinner.

My in-laws.

After dinner it was time to open gifts. Everyone was very sweet and generous and we were gifted a lot of great things.

Me and my husband. :)

Sam, Dalton, and Zach opening the last of their gifts. (Look at that mess behind them!)

Cindy with her fur-nephew. Doesn't Jackson look so happy?

It was a great night and I have to say, I'm pretty lucky to have this family as my in-laws. :)

Our Fur-Cousin's First Christmas

I have a ton of pictures to share with you of our Christmas, but Joe and I have both been feeling a bit under the weather, so I haven't had the energy to get things organized. Until then, I do have a picture to share with you of our fur-cousin, Bogey.

Bogey is my cousin's new dog and he celebrated his first Christmas with his forever family this year. Doesn't he look excited?

Okay, so he doesn't really look that excited. But he looks cute! And while I wasn't able to visit with him (or any of my family) this Christmas, I hear he had a wonderful time and got lots of great presents.

Merry Christmas to Bogey and all the new pets out there who finally have their forever home!

Ava Loves Her Dad

Joe always complains because he says Ava loves me more than she loves him. While I know she is a momma's girl, I also know that she absolutely adores her dad. And it's moments like this that prove my point:

Christmas Morning with Mom and Dad

On Sunday, we had Christmas morning with my parents. See, we are spending Christmas with Joe's family this year, so my parents decided to come up early to celebrate. And since my dad is leaving on a ten-week trip to California and Texas on Friday, this weekend was the chosen weekend. We pretended it was really Christmas - wishing each other Merry Christmas and opening presents. :)

First, the dogs got to open their presents. Since we have had the dogs, they have received presents. But until this year, they had never actually had any interest in opening them themselves. But Jackson was totally into it this year!

I think he thought he might be doing something wrong.

Ava required her servants to open hers. (Jackson ended up serving her, lol)

Then it was our time to open our presents.

Mom made me some amazing granola.

Jackson actually even helped my mom open her gift of two DVDs. :) (Yes, that is my mom's gift he has in his mouth. My mom thought it was soooo cute.)

And he helped Joe open his gift of an ipod dock.

I received a handsfree device for my phone. (I guess my mom got annoyed with me calling her all the time on the road, when it's illegal to do so.)

One of our gifts for my parents was tickets to the Gold Glass Cinemas in Redmond. And we headed there right away to watch the movie "The Next Three Days". (P.S. Super stressful movie. Seriously. But good.)

At the theater hanging out in the lobby.

Perusing the menu...

Kicked back, waiting for the movie to start.

Best. Theater. Ever.

My mom had to leave shortly after the movie ended, but it really was a great 'Christmas' morning. My dad, Joe and I all headed back home to relax. My dad left Monday morning.