viva las vegas

The day after Christmas Chris and I took our first trip away from Cameron since he was born. Chris's parents offered to stay a little longer in order to stay with him while we were gone. Thursday morning we headed out to Las Vegas with our friends, Jen and Eric. We had such a fun time! Despite it being absolutely frigid, we were able walk around a few hotels, including Caesar's, where we ate at the Cheesecake Factory the first night (are you really surprised??).

On Thursday, Eric and Chris dropped us off at a mall and they went to a couple of casinos where they found some cheap blackjack. Jen and I got some great shopping done. It was one of those trips where you felt very accomplished by the end. :)

A few highlights:
*Relaxing in Jen and Eric's room while the guys watched a football game
*Eating out every meal and taking our time while eating
*Finding some good bargains while shopping
*Having fun playing blackjack with our husbands coaching us
*Not having to worry AT ALL about Cameron because he was in such good hands!

christmas

Sorry this post is a tad late. We just back from a few days in Vegas which I'll post about later. We had a wonderful time with my family as well as Chris's family. His grandparents came all the way down from central California, which was very special. We also had his aunt, brother's family, his parents, and my parents over. I think one of the best parts of the time was that Cameron did very well, at least much better than we had anticipated. We had thought we would need to be upstairs most of the time while the family was downstairs, simply because of past performances of him in which he has gotten very overwhelmed by all the people. But he did surprisingly well and we were able to enjoy time all together.

It was a lot of fun to have my parents take part in the time. Since my sister lives in Germany (however she is coming for a visit in less than a week....ahhhh!!!!!!), it was great to have them come and share Chris's side of the festivities.

My favorite gift: Gift card to a spa
Chris's favorite gift: Gift card to Apple

familiar

Last night we had our good friends out for dinner. We made two scrumptious pizzas, bbq chicken and pesto chicken with sundried tomato (my favorite!). As we were sitting at the table, I kept thinking how nice it was to be with them. We rarely are all together anymore as they live out in OC. But when we do get together, it is like we never moved away. I get along GREAT with both girls and Chris gets along equally well with the guys. We really do "click", to use a girl term. :) There is something so nice about familiarity, isn't there?

Here the guys are playing "corn hole", which is a bean (corn) bag toss/horse shoe type game. Sorry the picture is so dark. Chris discovered the game when he attended a wedding out in North Carolina. He fell in love with it and added it to his Christmas list upon his return.



Ana and Jeremy (on the right) are expecting their first baby girl, Mia, in Feburary. We are all very excited!




Wendy (right) and Noah made the most delicious apply crisp for dessert. I could have eaten the crumblies off the whole thing!

Single Santa Seeks Mrs. Clause

One of my favorite parts about the Christmas season is the flood of Christmas movies that appear on TV. They are incredibly cheesy and sooo unrealistic, but I love every minute of them. Chris loves to make fun of them as well as me for watching them. His favorite thing to do is watch the first 5 minutes, then tell me exactly how the plot will play out (as they are quite predictable). Usually you can bank on a single, overworked woman who suddenly realizes she is tired of putting work before her life. She then stumbles onto Mr. Right, who is typically a lawyer who is also wanting to settle down. Throw in the best girlfriend who, despite being somewhat of a man eater, gives her good advice to, "go with your heart.", and you have the classic made for TV Christmas movie!

Here are a few favorites:
His and Hers Christmas
Christmas in Handcuffs
A Boyfriend for Christmas

p.s. Here is an adorable picture of a very curious little boy...

finished

Chris finished revamping his website yesterday. He has been working on it for several months! Take a look!

www.thrivestudios.com

who knew?

Today we went to Lake Perris. We had always driven by the signs for it, so we decided to see it for ourselves. Who knew a lake/camp ground was only 20 minutes away? We were the only ones there as it was pretty cold, but it was beautiful and made for some great pictures. I hear it can get pretty crowded/dirty in the summer and it costs $8 per car to get in (yikes!), so I'm not sure how often we'll frequent it, but it was still a fun outing and Cameron seemed to love walking on the sand and inching as close to the water as possible.

happenings as of late

*Cam is walking more and more. We love to just sit on our bed and watch him walk all around the place. Sooo cute!

*Cam's been showing his will a little more lately, throwing mini fits when he is fed something he doesn't like or when I go to change his diaper and he is not in the mood. I've read that by trying to calmly talk him through the fits is sometimes exactly what he wants, attention. So sometimes I simply ignore his drama and it seems to work well (for the most part).

*I've had two perfect nights of sleep (the first in over a month). Unfortunately it was due to food poisoning which made my stomach hurt so much I just conked out right away. As crazy as this may sound, it was worth it to get a good night's sleep. :(

*Today I'm meeting with some women about starting a playgroup in our church. I was involved in one at another church a while back. We have sooo many young families in our church. I know this is probably a great need for those moms that stay at home.

*My friend Karen came over for the day yesterday with her two kids. We had a great time and Cam did wonderful. I was a tad worried he might feel overwhelmed with the new people. We even got about an hour to sit and talk while the kids napped. Karen is SUPERB at asking questions, which as many of you know, is a huge quality I look for in friendships.

*I have loved that our direct tv has XM radio on some channels. They have the best Christmas station that is on most of the day in our home!

new snack

I've always loved pretzels. Back in college, my friends and I would buy the HUGE Costco bag of pretzels and leave it open in our room, snacking on it until it was empty. We would also snag some white chocolate chips from the cafeteria and bring them back to our dorm. We would then melt them, dip in the pretzels, and pop them in the fridge. Scrumptious!

These are pretzels (Rold Gold)I found that are delightful. They are cinnamon...not cinnamon and sugar, just cinnamon. The flavor is fabulous and I am constantly sneaking into the pantry for another handful. Please don't let Cam's baseball shirt fool you. I am in no way suggesting you to try and pass these on as a game time snack for your significant other. If I tried to feed pretzels to Chris for a "baseball snack", he would throw a pillow at me. They are very much a light, girl snack!

where are the real men?

Dr. Laura often asks this question. Usually, she is referring to the men who don't defend their wives from others mistreating them, who are content to sit around the house and not find work to help support their families, who don't discipline and leave it completely to their wives (and the list goes on)... Yesterday I was reminded of the fact that I'm so thankful I married a "real man". After looking out our back window and seeing a man trying to get his stuck car out of the mud, Chris got dressed and headed out into the drizzly weather to try and help. An hour later (and with the help of our neighbor's truck), they finally got it. How easy could it have been to pretend he didn't see the man struggling?



On a couple unrelated notes, many make fun of us (in good fun) for living out in the "909". For all those witty remarks, I offer this picture taken from our bedroom window. Beautiful, huh?



And lastly, yesterday was Lauren's (our niece) 1st birthday. Luckily the weather permitted the party to be held at a park and it was a lot of fun! In true Kelly fashion, I forgot my camera. Hopefully I'll get a hold of some pictures sometime and post them. Happy birthday Lauren!!!

cleaning

When it comes to housecleaning, there are certain things I let go, and certain things I don't. Generally, I'm pretty picky about clutter. We do have one counter in the kitchen that contains a few piles (and one "junk" drawer that contains who knows what!), but other than that, I don't like piles of junk mail, magazines, etc. around the house. I like for my kitchen counters to be clutter free as well as the coffee table. Some things I let go. For instance, I'll admit, we never make our bed unless company is coming over. Once Cam is older and we need to set an example, I'll start. But for now, what is the point if it doesn't bug us??? My closet is another area that I'm not too good about. More often than not, it is quite the disaster.

There are two areas that I'm very picky about. I HATE it when my stove top is dirty, mainly because it is black and shows everything (which has proven to be quite a pain). I also hate for that area around the washing machine lid to be dirty (where you put in the bleach). These two areas are somewhat odd, I realize, but they drive me nuts when I catch them dirty!! What odd areas are you particular about?

new hair

Many debate which is easier, short hair or long hair. I would venture to say if you are rating purely on the "easy" scale, long hair would win. How much easier could it be to throw your hair up in a ponytail, day after day...after day...after day...? Yes, this is what I had resorted to. It wasn't that I was too lazy to do it (well, I guess that was part of it), it was mainly that my hair got annoying always being in the way when dealing with Cam. But I have to admit the ponytail really started getting to me. So I made the decision to cut my hair. Yes, it is more work to make presentable (although only about 5-10 more minutes)...but it forces me to do it because I can't put it back.

I went to my friend, Liz, who did an EXCELLENT job! I would give it a 10!! I love the color she did and the cut is exactly what I wanted. It was also fun to have her do it because it meant that we got to catch up. I think we talked non-stop for the whole two hours! It was a lot of fun. Thanks, Liz!!

baseball in our future?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_oal5Gl_MA