Elf Dance

Last year and this one Ali and Ryan have posted such funny videos of themselves doing elf dances. I thought I may as join in on the fun too! (Don't forget to pause the playlist.)

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Yes, it' true ... finally

You all always want to know about my dear friend Sara. Whenever her name happens to come up, the first question is, "Is she engaged yet?" Well, my friends, Sara IS ENGAGED. And yes, she's marrying a boy from Utah (the kind of person she said she would never even date); I guess it's Steve's wonderful charm that finally got her! So, come the end of April, beginning of May, Brad and I will be in San Jose, California celebrating the beautiful wedding of Sara and Steve Fisher.

 

Perhaps I should include a picture of Sara and Steve. She's not marrying me after all.

 

Congratulations Sara and Steve. We couldn't be happier. You two are perfect for each other!

An Anniversary

Today was a day full of reminiscing for me since it has been exactly one year since my wonderful husband completely surprised me on a snowshoeing trip by asking me to marry him. One year ago today I decided to marry the most fantastic man in the world (no offense other ladies). I will never forget that day. Even now I can remember every detail as though it happened just yesterday. I had never experienced such absolute joy. One year ago today I made the best decision of my life.

Christmas in the Andersen Household

Well, I've been waiting for an important letter to arrive in the mail before I made another blog post, but it has yet to arrive. So in the meantime ... we've decorated our little house for Christmas! We absolutely LOVE the Christmas season. It's so joyful and exciting. I wish it was Christmas all the time, but if that was the case it probably wouldn't be so special.

Our front door!

Here were are putting up our little tree. Brad and I both prefer real Christmas trees, but it just didn't seem practical this year, so we got an artificial tree.

Here's our front window (I really need to sew a curtain for it, but for now tinsel will have to do).

Our stockings! We're planning on decorating them; we just haven't gotten to it yet.

The finished product. Looks pretty good for a fake tree, if I do say so myself.

This is an ornament my aunt gave all the girls last year for Christmas. My grandmother and all her sisters had one of these to put on their family tree growing up. So my aunt thought it would be a great tradition for us to start as well.

We hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season!!

Happy Birthday Elizabeth!

Today, November 29, is my baby sister Elizabeth's birthday! She is 13, a teenager. I know I've said this for all the birthdays I've posted about this month, but I seriously can't believe how old she is. I can still remember the day she was born and how much I absolutely adored her. I truly believe that youngest children are the most resilient of any other kids because of what she's been through in her young life. I lugged her around ALL the time for as long as I could carry her and my brothers love to pick on her now that she's a little older and she's totally fine!

By far the cutest baby in the family.

 

She's a great little soccer player. She's even on the middle school team!

 

 

The day she got her braces off.

Happy Birthday Elizabeth! I still absolutely adore you!

Happy Birthday Phillip!

Today is my brother Phillip's birthday! He's 17, and how the time has flown. I seriously can't believe how old he is. He is probably at least twice my size, if not bigger, and can easily pick me up from one spot and move me to another without any effort at all.

(This is probably my favorite picture of the two of us. He loves it too. I framed it for him a few years ago, and it sits on the dresser in his room.)

 

 

Happy birthday Phillip! Love ya little bro!

Happy Birthday Chloe and Ryan!

Chloe is the spunkiest kid I know, and today she is 4 years old! 

 

I absolutely love her to death! In just a few days (7 1/2 to be exact) Brad and I will be flying out to Colorado for Thanksgiving. I can't even imagine the fun things we'll be getting into with Chloe around. Last Thanksgiving we watched Mary Poppins at least 3 times in the four days we were there, we baked in her kitchen in her room, we went to the playground, and we read stories. With another year of experience behind her I bet we'll be baking cordon blu instead of chocolate chip cookies this go around.

Chloe is the best big sister also. In October, we all went to Salt Lake for a wedding. While there, Chloe wanted to go run around on the temple grounds while Valeri took some pictures. I told her it was fine just not to go too far. Before she left she looked me right in the eye and said, "Watch my little brother while I'm gone!". I held back a laugh and said ok. It was so cute that she wouldn't go play until she knew Ryan was taken care of.

Happy Birthday to our favorite niece!!

(Brad with Chloe after he got off his mission)

(Chloe and I at our wedding in May)

Ryan, Chloe's baby brother, turned one last Monday! I remember last year going to visit when he was only a few weeks old, and now he's already one! As I get older I am continually amazed at how fast each year really goes. When I was younger I remember thinking how long it took it get to my next birthday (that's how I choose to measure a year), and now birthdays come and go so quickly I can hardly keep track. That's how I feel with little Ryan, and I'm sure his mother would agree. 

Ryan is the sweetest tempered baby I have ever seen. He is constantly happy and pretty much up for anything. Even when he cries it's just so sweet. I can only hope I have a baby like him.

Happy Birthday one and all!

6 months down, eternity to go

On Friday, Brad and I celebrated 6 months of being married. While doing something for a 6 month anniversary may seem silly we had a ton of fun, and we probably will never celebrate a half year anniversary again. 

After class Brad took me to Border's and we read Where the Wild Things Are. After we had finished reading I made a comment about the movie, and he said "Why don't we go find out?" So, we headed off to the theater to see it. It was so so good! I think they used almost every single line from the book, which was really fun. It was interesting to see how they added to the plot. I suggest you go see it if you haven't (maybe wait till it gets to Redbox so you don't have to pay the outrageous prices in the theater).

 After the movie we went out to dinner and then went to the mall to look for some boots for me. We didn't end up finding any, but we did score a great deal on jeans at American Eagle (2 pairs for $25).

I'm so grateful for how my wonderful husband treats me every day and how he surprises me with the little things that he knows I'll love. These past 6 months have absolutely flown by and I can't even believe they're already over, but I'm looking forward to the eternity ahead that we'll get to share together.

Nanny

On Monday my dad's mother died of a massive heart attack. While we are all devastated by this unexpected loss, we are glad she experienced no pain. My grandmother had type I diabetes, and for the past couple years has been suffering due to her lifelong disease. Fortunately, I was able to see her (and Brad was able to meet her) at our wedding back in May. She was very frail even then, so I'm so glad she was able to make it.

My grandfather died the summer before my sophomore year of high school (about 7 years ago), so we're all so happy Nanny will finally be reunited with Pawpaw. Hopefully, I'll be able to get their records together soon, and Brad and I can go do all their temple work for them since neither of them were members. My dad tried several times to get my grandmother to convert to the church, but she was a very strong Southern Baptist. She told him she believed it but she just couldn't leave her own church. I know that they will both accept the gospel since they can now see the whole picture.

I wish I had more pictures to post of my wonderful Nanny, but they'll all back at home in Tennessee, so the wedding picture is the only one I have here. My grandmother taught me so many wonderful things, like how to sew a blanket stitch (and all the others) , how to cross stitch, and the difference between a direct and indirect object and what a past participle was - she was a high school English teacher. I will greatly miss her, but I know she's in a much better place now with her soon-to-be eternal husband (once Brad and I do the work).

Her funeral is today in Marion, NC - the city both my parents are from. My whole family will be there, including my dad's sister's kids who we haven't seen for a long time. Unfortunately, Brittney and I weren't able to fly back home on such short notice. My mom and I called every airline imaginable and none offered bereavement fares, so the cheapest ticket we could find was $700. Brittney and I were so disappointed, but we definitely didn't want our family paying $1400 just to see us for 2 days. I know my Nanny is glad we didn't spend the money, but we are definitely thinking of her today.

Pumpkin Carvings

Here we are getting out the insides.

Brad, concentrating hard.

 Final products

 

Pumpkin Sunday

Our pumpkin fun day started off after church with delicious chicken noodle soup in pumpkin bread bowls.

After our wonderful dinner we carved our Halloween pumpkins.

 

Can you guess whose is who?

 

 

Check out the next post for the answer.

a calling

Brad and I have been in our married student ward since the end of May (about 5 months). Only 2 weeks after we arrived Brad received the calling of Elder's Quorum Secretary (the exact same calling he's had since he got home from his mission - 3 years ago!). After 5 months I had yet to receive any calling at all. I thought I had somehow flown under the radar, and that was fine with me.

Well, my days of not having a calling are officially over. They caught me.

Today I was sustained as the 1st counselor in the stake primary presidency! I'm really excited even though I have no idea what the stake primary presidency even does, but it means I get to keep going to Sunday School with Brad and going to Relief Society. Today after stake conference we all met with the second counselor in the stake presidency and decided we were going to have a Halloween party for all the kids. Even though we only have 2 weeks to plan (and I have no idea what I'm doing), I know it'll work out and will be a blast!

A Wedding

Brady and Sara got married on Wednesday! They both looked absolutely fantastic. Sara was actually sick the night before with the stomach flu and threw up 15 times...poor girl! You would never know from looking at her the next day though.

picture by Valeri Andersen

 Here we are at the reception...I love this picture of Brad!

The whole family stayed up at a cabin in Brighton on Tuesday night, but since I had to take a test Wednesday morning Brad and I stayed in Provo. We did get to hang out at the cabin on Wednesday night before we headed back though.

 

Conference Weekend

Since Brady and Sara are getting married TOMORROW, Brad's whole family is in town. This past weekend we went up to the Croft's cabin in Park City. Brad and I had visited the cabin over the summer and had so much fun, so we were excited to go back. We got there Friday night and stayed until Sunday morning. Saturday we went on a little hike and stumbled upon a dead porcupine; I had never seen one before so this was exciting.

After our walk we went ATVing with Ryan and Ali.

The rest of the day we just hung out, and that night while the boys were at Priesthood Session all the girls went shopping. After the session was over we all met up for dinner. Sunday morning brought lots of snow. We packed up the car and headed out. The roads to the cabin aren't paved, so driving out there were a few times we weren't sure we'd be able to make it, but with Jeff behind us reassuring us he'd push us if we needed it and Brad's creative driving we made it.

We had Sunday afternoon conference tickets. Here are some pictures we took while we were waiting for it to start.

 

 

 Conference was AMAZING and we all definitely enjoyed ourselves.