ode to love day

Valentine's day is just around the corner! Here are some of the things we've done so far to celebrate...

T.P. roll heart stamped cards...
This was SO fun! C figured out how to stamp the hearts all by himself and made 7 cards before he was ready to move onto something else (I'd say that's pretty good for a one-year-old).

Here's what you need...

  

Here's how you do it... 

So it's pretty self-explanatory but just take your t.p. roll and pinch the top in a line all the way down the roll. Then directly parallel, pinch the bottom out all the way down the roll and it should make the heart shape. Then just dip, stamp, repeat!

 

 

**I highly recommend you use non-toxic, washable paint**

Clearly C had a taste or two of the paint.

My gorge mama friend, Jen, over at delightfuldeets.com made these cute v-day cards using heart shaped cookie cutters!

Valentine's photo shoot...
My lovely friend Sasha over at moiology.com helped me take some cute valentine's pics of C.
We're planning on sending them out (with C's heart cards) to some of our far-away-fam for v-day.

(They still need to be edited, but here are a few of my favorites)

Sugar Cookies baked with love...
We made a couple of goodie bags for our sweet neighbors that shoveled the snow off our driveway and porch TWO days in a row.
They included chocolates, cocoa mix, and these delicious sugar cookies!

Leave a comment or a link and let us know how you're celebrating love day!

Here are some other super cute ideas I found on pinterest that I'd like to try someday...

*52 Things I Love About You *Heart Strings *Love Notes for the Kiddos

Moving on moving on from town to town...

Not really town to town, just 1.91 miles away (according to mapquest).

So you may have heard that Brandon and I have moved! It's kind of a funny story and we're both a little shocked that it happened but it happened!

So here's the story....

We had been talking about moving for the last few months but we never really

acted on it. Friday morning as we were driving to work we thought we might call our landlord and see if we could look at some apartments. He told us that he had two places just like ours and one that was newly renovated. We asked if we could look at the newly renovated one after work around 7:00p. Our landlord said "Sure! But I'm showing the apartment to another couple at 3:30p." Brandon jumped right in and said he'd meet at 12:30p. Brandon walked in the apartment and told him we wanted it so we signed the contract, got the keys, rented a Uhal, and started moving right after work! Our old apartment was emptied by 2:00p on Saturday and our new apartment was completely set up by 5:00p on Sunday. We even watched both sessions of conference! It all happened so fast but we absolutely love our new place!

Here are some pictures...they don't really do our home justice but it will have to do. All we have left to do is hang the mirror in our bedroom and the pictures in the living room and kitchen.

the living room

brandon's favorite spot in the house

our living room (with a box of pictures waiting to be hung)

the bedroom (with our huge mirror waiting to be hung)

renee's favorite spot in the house

the potty

the kitchen

Home sweet home! What do you think?

Now that you've seen our new place you'll have to go back and compare what our old place was like =/

Weekend Project!

Brandon is the best husband ever! I always tell him how much I love doing crafts and different fun projects but it's just such a pain to dig through a bunch of cardboard boxes in the back of our closet. So he decided that we should turn our spare room into a craft room. I was so thrilled to get started on this project! We cleaned everything out of the room, reorganized the closets, did a few creative crafts and redecorated.

What do you think of the end result?

My wonderfully organized craft shelf...I made the damask paper holder :)

Some water colors I painted and hung with black ribbon...

This used to be an ugly blue cork board but a little ribbon and a few pictures spruced it right up!

Some of my shoes that still don't fit on my shoe rack...

Brandon's Corner ;)

The End

---------Sprout Update---------

Success!

Last Saturday Brandon and I decided to plant a little garden on our front porch. I was really worried that it would be too late in the year to plant seeds but we did it anyway.

The packet said the flowers would sprout in 7 days...well needless to say, on the seventh day this is what we found...

Little sprouts!!!

Family Fun Time!

I LOVE FAMILY TIME!

The Sunday after Christmas we had a little family reunion. I was so sad because Brandon and I had to go back to Utah before the party but luckily Brandon pulled some strings and we were able to stay until Monday!

Family, friends, and like always...ToNs of food.

Brandon got a little taste of Poly feasting!

Mom had a little Kalani Islanders reunion.

I got to see some family that I haven't seen in years!



Our little fam fest was the perfect ending to our Christmas trip in California.

Now we're back in Utah...freezing...and praying that we'll be back in Cali soon!

4 Christmases!

Home Sweet Home for Christmas!

This was Brandon and my first Christmas together as a married couple.

The day was loaded with family, food, presents, and lots of LoVe! We actually started our Christmas festivities on Christmas Eve with Brandon's family. We went to his house and opened one gift...PJs! Then we went out to dinner with Steve, Shel, Cam, and Adam! After some delicious din, we came home and opened one gift with my family, watched Elf, and had a sleepover in our room with Danika, Amber and Cj.

Christmas morning we woke up bright and early and waited to see what Santa brought.

Yes, we just woke up...

I love stocking goodies!

My little bro bro is getting so BIG!

Love my sissys!

After we saw what Santa brought, we opened our gifts and had Christmas breakfast Hawaiian style with Auntie Nani, Uncle Dave, Jaymi, and Sara. Then it was off to Brandon's house for our Christmas breakfast part 2 with Steve, Shelly, and the triples! We opened gifts, stockings, and just relaxed until Linda, Peter, and Byron came over with many more wonderful treats! We stuffed our bellies full of snacks then ran back down to my house for dinner and presents with the Norris family!

We had so much fun spending time with our family (especially my Great Grandma Carol!)

We are so grateful that we were able to make it down for Christmas this year. We can't wait until the next time we're able to visit our home sweet home in beautiful California!