merry christmas, life group, elephants on parade, and a visit from the trempers...

Merry Christmas Everyone!

i hope that you all enjoy your holiday...as we celebrate Christ's birth i am reminded of all that i am thankful for. we have been blessed this year with circumstances and blessings that have been perfectly orchestrated by our loving heavenly Father. God prepared a wonderful place for us in fresno and we are grateful for aaron's job, a wonderful new house, great new friends who we have come to love and of course paige (the most wonderful christmas gift of all)! as i look at all of our christmas cards i am reminded that we are fortunate to have many wonderful extended families, great friends from growing up and amazing friends from college, new friends from our time in orange county and now fresno...we love you all. here are some pictures from the past week...we have more to come as my family left yesterday and aaron's family comes tomorrow!

merry christmas and may you be blessed in the new year!

our life group...we love these guys!

trent, deAuna, tim, tokunbo, me & paige, josh, katrina, adam & ashley
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this was our christmas gift exchange and party (unfortunately aaron was working and paige and i had to miss the walk down christmas tree lane...but it was still fun)!

our fun dinner to celebrate tim and deauna's birthdays!

elephants on parade!thank you ailie for my elephant shirt...i can finally wear it!

we love the trempers...so we were thrilled when we all decided to make it a tradition to get together every december for christmas. they agreed to come here for a few nights and boy did we have fun, fun, fun!

elsie (3), matt, carson (10 months), mishawn, me (auntie lala), paige (16 weeks), aaron (uncle a)

pictures with santa...the girls did great!
elsie loved holding paige...she couldn't get enough of her. at one point aaron said "you can hold her-but she is really hungry..." and this is what happened! aaron said elsie was giggling and saying "she is trying to feed from me uncle a..."

we opened presents together...

elsie loved her ballerina princess story (her name was in the book, along with carson & paige and where she lives...very cool!)

all three girls got a bath together...so fun!

elsie helped me make wrapping paper...she did such a great job!

patem pad & all thumbs...

thank you aunt ev for my new patemm pad! i love it and don't i look good in green! also, don't you just love my cute cloth diapers (bumgenius)! thanks to grammy marilyn for helping us get these! we love them!

paige is all thumbs these days!

"what up mommy?"

...beauty queen, giggles, metro wrap up, plastic seagull & one year in fresno!

our beauty queen!

GIGGLES: paige is getting very vocal and she giggled for the first time the other day...she loves to smile and play like this...i took some pictures because i just love when she is so happy like this!

these days the hands are always in the mouth- she sucks her thumb a lot now too.

METRO WRAP UP: i finally figured out a few other ways to hold paige in the metro wrap...now that she can see she wants to face out. there is one way...she is like a little bundle! i had her like this at church and she fell asleep as soon as the worship music started (i did have to keep walking around in the back) but she loves it. so cute this girl!

ONE YEAR IN FRESNO: so it has officially been a year since we moved from southern california. crazy! here are some pictures of our moving day and our friends who helped us...we have moved a lot...so it is amazing that anyone is still willing to help us move at this point! anyways, thanks to the trempers, meadows and eric for all your help. we miss all our friends down in so cal.

PLASTIC SEAGULL: this is one of three gold seagulls that hung on my grandparents wall for like 40 years! they had been there so long there was dirt imprints of seagulls on the wall when we took them down. we snuck one into my parents house and displayed it gloriously on the mantle while they were not looking...it was fun! the best part is that i always thought they were brass or gold...oh no...they were plastic & hollow!

jer & sharon are always helping us! they are the best! p.s. happy belated birthday sharon!

even though we have moved every year and a half of our marriage- we have a lot of stuff!

mishawn was prego with carson...and i was prego with paige (but didn't know it yet and kept wondering why i was so tired)!

my girl elsie!

eric (our favorite islands employee) & aaron

here are a few pictures from my last day with fullmer...i miss you all too!

uncle ray...he was my boss...crazy guy!

me & scott!

the ladies: patty, diana, lori, me, jordyn, karlyn (and denise not pictured)

i made a lot of great friends at fullmer (many of them i do not have pictures with)...but i miss working there. it was also great working for my uncle ray- even though he is crazy- it was fun and most of the time i loved it.