Brady has successfully completed his 1st quarter of chiropractic school and has now started his 2nd. YAY!!! I am so happy that Brady has finally started chiropractic school and we can now start the countdown. :) I know that it is going to be hard at times for the both of us, but it is going to be so worth it! One of the things that I am excited about is that after every quarter we get a 2 week break! Since Brady finished his 1st quarter right before Christmas, we got a 2 week vacation. For our vacation we went to my parents' house in Idaho for Christmas. We had such a good time!!
All of my brothers and their families came too. Even my brother Blair and his family, who now live in Iowa, flew in! It was so much fun to be able to have the entire family together and get to play with all the babies! :) I got to meet my new niece Rudi and my new nephew Jett. They were so little and adorable! I just couldn't believe that Alayna use to be that little!
This year Brady got to experience being Santa Clause! On Christmas Eve Brady and my dad went out to deliver presents to my parents neighbors and one of them asked Brady if he would come over Christmas morning as Santa Clause. Of course Brady said he would. On Christmas morning Alayna saw Brady dressed up as Santa and just stared at him and put her arms up like she wanted him to pick her up. Brady picked her up and started saying things like "Ho Ho Ho! Merry Christmas!" She just stared at him and smiled. I think that Brady's voice is what gave it away because when Brady started to walk out the door to go to the neighbor's house Alayna started running after him crying and saying "Dada." Hahaha! She is so smart!
When Brady got home we opened presents. We were definitely spoiled by our families this year. :) My favorite present I got this year was definitely my mom's wedding ring! My mom gave me her wedding ring that she hasn't worn in like 21 years and Brady and I got it sized to fit my finger. I am so excited because I haven't worn a wedding ring for a while now because I lost mine. I am also excited because this is a real wedding ring! Before Brady and I got married we decided that we weren't going to spend the money on a real wedding ring until we were older. I also think my new ring is awesome because I know that my Dad picked it out years ago. I also got lots of other great gifts too. :)
Alayna of course had a BLAST opening up all her presents! It took quite a while to finish opening up everything because Alayna just wanted to play with whatever toy she had already opened. Later that day we had a nice dinner and then just spent the day enjoying each other's company. We had a great Christmas day. The day after Christmas my two other brothers got here and then we were ready to have even more fun!
During this vacation we went and saw the movie "Les Miss" and "The Hobbit." I definitely liked "The Hobbit" more. I just don't really like musicals (don't judge me). We also went to the church so that the boys could play basketball while us moms made sure our kids didn't get ran over. Haha. One more thing we did was go sledding in my parents pasture. We tie the sled to the back of the four-wheeler and drive around! So much fun!! My brothers and I have so many memories doing this. :)
We also had a really good New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. On New Year's Eve we stayed up till midnight (of course!). We ate a yummy dinner, played games, and watched a movie. The next day we had another yummy New Year's dinner. We also went out into my parents pasture and shot clay pigeons. This was not as fun for me as it was for the boys. The first shotgun they gave me to shoot was the 12 gage, which is the most powerful one! It kicked me so hard that it almost knocked me down! Of course everyone thought that was funny. Later that day me, Brady, and Blair went to see "The Hobbit". When we got back from the movie, I held out my arms for Alayna to come run up to me and give me a hug. Instead she ran right past me and my open arms and went straight up to Blair and held her arms up for him to pick her up! Little stinker! At least I know she loves her uncle. haha
Alayna especially had a blast being there with everyone! She just loves being the center of attention and when there are that many people around she always has someone's attention and she loves it! I just love it that you can totally tell that she really loves her aunts and uncles. I think Brian is her dancing uncle because he introduced her to this "gangman style" dance. After that whenever Brian was over Alayna would have to run up to him and start to dance. Haha. Alayna also really loved her new baby cousins and loved to give them kisses. It was really cute to watch her love her baby cousins and give them kiss after kiss until I had to force her to stop. Haha. She really got to practice being "soft" this Christmas break.
Something that I learned about Alayna that I didn't know about her was what a sweet tooth she has!! This crazy girl is only one year old and she is already starting to sneak sweets! I don't know how many times I caught her climbing on the table with a mouth full of candy and both hands full as well. It was really funny because it kinda became a game to her. She would come up to me and show me she had candy in her mouth and more in her hand and once she knew that I had seen her, she would turn and book it down the house running away from me with a big chocolaty smile. Hahaha. Watching Alayna have so much fun was probably my favorite part of the whole vacation. We had such a great Christmas break and I was a little sad to come back to the dark and rainy Oregon.
