nice december happenings

via

phone photos

 

do you remember our dear friend we met in this post?

well we tried to visit him and were so happy to finally find his apartment door but sadly he didn't answer. my smile is deceiving, we were bummed.

what would christmas be without an ugly sweater party?

(or a sweater that has "i heart kevin" on the back or a jackson hole trap club hat?)

i'm glad savers pulled through with another winner this year. santa in a stocking! who would have thought.

we didn't really have set plans one night so we decided to go just check out some toys. we loved finding all the toys we would play with when we were little and the books that we would have loved to receive. and you can't forget that classy cat vest i wanted so badly to buy for ryan's dog. 

afterwards ryan was really nice to let me get a personal pan pizza. i don't know why i love those things so much and i know eating them at 11 at night is the grossest but i'm fairly certain i'm addicted.

bnotd = zane gray was home and let us come in and visit! we had a lovely time watching tv with him and trying to fit in a question or two about his life. I don't really know if he remembered us or even if he liked our visit but i was happy to see him again and had to refrain from shouting "we love you zane!" as we walked out the door.

the picture above and below would be us appreciating the decor at the courtyard at jamestown assisted living center, where zane resides.

this pretty lady got married and had her reception at the gallivan center stage. who knew that was even possible? she looked gorgeous and it was so nice to see her and be around so many chinese speaking people! (her mother-in-law is taiwanese and her now husband served a chinese speaking mission as well)

we wanted to stick around and see the lights but temple square was being nuts so instead we headed over to the grand america hotel. ever since my interior design teacher raved about the fabrics, furniture, and overall style of the building i've wanted to check it out and i'm so happy we did!

i don't know how i've never made it to that place but i was glad because it was fun to experience something new. everything was just so nice and fancy! and everyone there just loved looking so nice and fancy, i felt like i was in a movie of some sort and kind of felt slightly under dressed.

buuuut i didn't even care because i was too busy loving everything about it and taking pictures of that GREAT jou jou toy store, self portraits (together portraits? what would you call that with two people?) in every fancy mirror i could find, and being obsessed with the window displays and finding the star with maurice the penguin.

aaand being with this ryan fellow who i'm almost certain loved it as much as i did and who was such good company.

my brother bought a puppy!!! i'm not a big dog fan but i loooove puppies.  his name is kato and we are in love.

we decided to give temple square another go and went last friday. might i say it was perfect!

usually it is freezing so being there for a long period of time is painful but it wasn't very cold so we ended up spending hours enjoying everything about it. we loved going to the visitor center to see the Christus, the short film about Christ's birth, and to check out the fairly new "families are forever" interactive movie. then we headed over to the other visitor center and stared at the miniature replica of the temple and talked about how badly we wanted to go to all the rooms that we will never have access to.

then we checked out the family search area and i was excited to show ryan the fake ellis island i had discovered while doing some bridals around there a few days earlier. free picture taken by cute little senior missionaries in fake ellis island? yes please.

we decided to dine at the nauvoo cafe and got the best view of the temple! i just wanted to sit there and stare at it all night. it was all so lovely, even if we did have to wait an hour in line to get our food and make up a christmas a to z game to pass the time. and let's talk about that guy playing the piano in the joseph smith memorial building! i wish i had the time to just sit in that building the entire month of december and listen to all the free concerts and enjoy all the other nice things happening on temple square. we (and by we i mean those of us who live in utah) are so lucky to live so close to such a wonderful place! it really helped me feel like Christmas inside and reminded me what Christmas is all about.

and just when i thought the night couldn't get any better we headed over to a festivus celebration! i was a liiiittle disappointed that no one was really there but we did arrive at ten pm so perhaps we missed the crowd? with that being said it was still so fun to catch up with mike and ryan (aka clay..still can't bring myself to call him that), enjoy the chocolate fountain, and die over the best russian dolls i've ever seen. all in all it was a wonderful night.

christmas eve with the margetts was a delight. wendy got a brand new table which fit us all so nicely, dinner was delicious, the re-creation of luke 2 was a hit, and everyone's christmas dreams were fulfilled through wendy's impeccable shopping skills. i really love that family.

and i really love that yesterday russ had to fix some things at their cabin and invited us to come along!

i had not been there foreverrrr so i was happy to go for a little bit.

we enjoyed watching the rise of the planet of the apes in our pj's which is weird because a. i really did enjoy it! i thought for sure i would hate it and b. it was like 4 in the afternoon and we were still wearing pajamas.

 then, sadly, we had to actually finish the movie in the car because we needed to get back in time for game night with the becks. but even just the short amount of time we spent there was so nice!

aaaaand there was even a little snow! which made me very happy.