A Very Merry Christmas!

We had a wonderful Christmas. We started out by sleeping in, and then when we got up, we made a big breakfast (this is one of the few times a year we actually eat something besides cereal) and then we opened up presents. Manny outdoes himself each year and always gives me a wonderful Christmas.

Here I am with some of my spoils.

Here's Manny with his, although he didn't want to take anything out of the boxes.

This year, we decided to the ugliest Christmas tree ever. I wish the picture was better. If you came to our house, you would be able to see how ugly it it. We had a good laugh every time we plugged in the lights.

After, we went to my parents house to drop off presents. I was able to see my sister and her kids who were there at the time.

Ashlyn, Colleen, Nick, Mekel, Ryan

Later that day, we went to have dinner at Manny's parents' house. After dinner we exchanged gifts. Manny's nephew, Jared was the MC for the night. He would annouce extremely loud to everyone who the gift was from, who it was to, and what they got. He is a real crack up everytime we see him. He's one of Manny's best buds.

After a fun-filled, long day. We finally went home to relax. Just when I thought the day was as good as it was going to get, Manny surprised me with one last gift. A Kindle! I've been wanting one forever. I just about jumped through the roof with excitement. I'm so excited to start using it.

I know that Christmas isn't about the gifts or what I got, it's definitely a nice added bonus. I'm greatful that I was able to spend time with our families and enjoy each other. I;m especially greatful for a wonderful husband who goes out of his way to always make Christmas such a special time for us. I hope everyone out there had a wonderful holiday. Merry Christmas!

BUSY WEEKEND

Ryan and Manny

Last weekend we had a bunch going on. First off, Manny baptized my nephew Ryan( my older sister's son). Ryan was so excited. Manny had to dunk him in the water a total of three times because he kept having a foot or a knee pop up. It was pretty funny, but I felt bad for them because the water was freezing cold.

My family NEVER takes any pictures together, so we decided that after the baptism would be a good time to take a bunch of pictures.

For some reason, all the grandkids wanted to take a picture with Manny. The tall redhead, and the kid in the white shirt on the far right actually aren't part of our family.

From far left: my Mom, Michaela, Paul (holding Solomon), Me, Joseph, my Dad, Colleen, Tim, and Julie. I'm actually missing my brother Stephen.

my sister's Julie, Colleen, me, Michaela, and my niece Ashlyn just happen to get in the shot.

This is my nephew Xander, I don't know what he was crying about.

My brother Paul and his son Solomon.

Later that night, we had a Christmas party at Manny's parents' house. We ate some good food and Santa visited us later. The grandkids were excited to get presents from Santa early this year.

Here we are enjoying the Christmas party. I cant' get Manny to ever take a normal picture. He always has to make some sort of face.

On Sunday, we had a dinner for my younger brother, Tim. He left for the Marines on Monday. It was really sad to say goodbye. I'm glad that he will be serving our country, but it makes me nervous. Manny and I went over to my parents' house while they were at church so we could put a new dishwasher in for them. Theirs broke a little while ago, so me and all my siblings decided to chip in and give them on for Christmas. And then Manny was volunteered to put it in since he's the plumber.

Then on Monday night, my brother Paul, his wife gave birth to their 4th child. They were expecting a boy, but when it came out, it was a girl! Everyone was absolutely shocked! They had to hurry and think of a new name for her. She is such a little doll. She has tons of dark hair. They ended up naming her Chelsea Bryce Gonzalez. Bryce is my brother Tim's(the one who just left for the Marines) middle name. They were going to name the baby after him, but when it came out a girl, they had to do some rearranging. I wish I had gotten a picture, she is beautiful.

Kids Say Such Funny Things

Today at school I heard a boy ask a teacher whose hair is going gray, "Where did all the color in your hair go?"


PS, does anyone know how to make the main picture of me and Manny smaller. I pushed the button 'shrink to fit,' but it's still huge and looks fuzzy.

A HAPPY THANKSGIVING

We had a very nice Thanksgiving this year at my parents' house. I actually made the turkey...a first ever for me, and it was yummy. I have a big family, there are 8 kids in all, and there are lots of grandkids. Plus we had some other family and friends over, so we had a FULL house! After dinner, me, Manny, my two younger brothers, and all the grandkids went outside to play baseball. It was hilarious watching them hit and then running to the wrong base. Afterwards, the kids went inside to make Christmas ornaments and write letters to Santa, and eat all the good desserts that were brought. After dinner there, we went to Old Navy because they were having a really good sale, and then we went to Manny's parents' house in PG for dessert again. We were so stuffed! It's too bad that I forgot the camera and didn't take pictures of anything. I hope everyone else had a great Thanksgiving.

OOOOLLLLLEEEE, OLE, OLE, OLE!

I thought I would document this momentous occasion just for Manny. Real Salt Lake just won the MLS Cup Championship. They beat the LA Galaxy. Take that Beckham and Donovan! I'm sure you can imagine all the cheering and yelling going on at my house these past few hours. Go REAL SALT LAKE!

"WHOOP THERE IT IS"

We went fishing at Strawberry again on Saturday. Manny didn't know that I was recording him.

The fish spalshed into the water so I wasn't able to get a picture of it.

On a side note, yesterday on the 24th was the 7 year anniversary since the first time I had ever met Manny. We don't celebrate this anniversary or anything, I just happen to realize the date and so I started thinking about it. I can't believe that 7 years has flown by so fast. Manny and I were set up on a blind date, so it was a little nerve racking because I just kept thinking about how he could be some ugly, weird freak and that this could be the worst date ever. But it wasn't. Our date only lasted about an hour. We went out to eat and that was it. On our date, he said to me, "I hope you don't mind, we're only going to eat and then I'll take you home. That way if you decide you don't like me, then you don't have to be around me for very long." I thought, Man, this guy is smart, sounds good to me. Turned out, I wouldn't have minded if our date was a little longer.

A WEEKEND OF BREAKING RECORDS

Friday morning, Manny and I went fishing at Strawberry. We had a great time catching some big fish!

You might want to turn up the volume to hear Manny better. He really believes in jinxes. I didn't jinx him though. The fish ended up being 22 inches. That's the biggest fish for Manny to date.

Here's the 22 incher. Record number 1. He was so happy. And, he caught it on a fly pole which he doesn't use very much.

The next video is of a 19 inch fish he caught.

The picture below is of the 19 1/4 inch fish that I caught. This is record number 2. I seem to only ever catch much smaller fish, so I was glad that I finally caught a bigger one. I had to have Manny unhook it and hold it, because I may catch the fish, but I definitely do not touch them. Record number 3...I caught this on a fly pole too. This was my first time ever using a fly pole.

We caught quite a few others, but I won't post the pictures because they pretty much all look the same. All of the fish were caught on a fly pole and they were all between 18 1/2" and 22".

I thought I'd add the picture of the dead pelican that I took. It was lying on the side of the lake next to where we parked. It was really big. And, gross, I know, but I was still fascinated with it.

Saturday, we went to Scofield with my brother in-law Big Ryan and my nephew Little Ryan. Record number 4 is that I caught the most fish that I have ever caught at once time. 9...and I know that's not very many for some people (like Manny), but again, I'm not the best fisherwoman, so I was happy to break another record and catch a lot of fish. There was a total of 30 caught between us. My newphew broke record number 5. I taught him how to cast and retrieve and he ended up catching a fish all by himself with my pole. He was so excited, and I think all the adults had a better time watching him reel it in than we did catching our own fish.

And earlier today, we went fishing at Salem Pond. Manny's nephew Jared has been asking him for weeks to take him. Jared has never been fishing before, so Manny was happy to take him. I love watching Manny and Jared together. You can just tell that they absolutely love to play together. Here's a video of Jared catching his first fish, record number 6.

Manny and Jared with his first fish. Jared didn't want to get too close to the fish.

And here is a video of Jared catching his 2nd fish.

Yeah, it was a good weekend of fishing.

FISH LAKE

Manny and I went to Fish Lake the last weekend in September. We were thinking that it was going to be a little cold, but it wasn't. The weather was perfect. We had such a blast camping out. We rented a boat and spent the whole day on the lake on Saturday and caught quite a few fish. It was quiet and peaceful because the lodges around the lake were either already closed or just about to close for the season, so there weren't that many people there.

We were able to enjoy all the beautiful color changes in the mountains. Each night, we listened to the elk buguling. It would last until morning. That was probably one of Manny's favorite parts of the trip. I didn't take very many pictures. Most of the ones I took were of the lake and the mountains.

Here's a family of deer that we saw while we were fishing. We saw a lot of deer during this trip!

This is another lake that we stopped at, but I don't remember the name of it.

FALL ALREADY?

Fall is now official! Summer has come and gone in lightning speed and now it's Autumn time. I'm happy about it because Fall is by far my most FAVORITE season of all. I love all the bright colors on the mountains and on the trees that line my neighborhood. The absolute best part of this time of year is Halloween. This is hands down, my favorite holiday! I know it's still a little over a month away, but I don't care. I just couldn't wait any longer and have already started decorating my house. I'm not completely done with decorating. I've only put up a few Fall and Halloween things. I'm trying as hard as I can until Oct. 1st to put everything else up. So far, here's a couple of things I've done...

I'm proud of myself because I made this cornucopia on my own. I'm not really a very creative or crafty person. Hopefully, I'll be adding a bit more to the cornucopia and this little display on my table.

I can't wait to get into the mountains and take a drive through all the pretty colors! Happy Fall Everyone. I hope you enjoy the beautiful change as much as I do.

6 YEARS AGO...

SEPTEMBER 6, 2003

We were married in the Salt Lake City Temple. These definitely aren't the best photos. I tried to upload much better and prettier pictures from the temple, but for some reason, they just wouldn't upload. So here are a few of the pictures that I have from our reception. It was held in the ballroom of the old BYU Academy (Provo Library). The song that is playing on our blog right now is the one that we danced to at our wedding. It's about saying goodbye to a lonely life and starting a new one with someone you love. I thought it was fitting for a wedding.

MORE CAMPING

Last weekend on a spur of the moment, we decided to go camping in Mayfield. We found a nice little secluded spot, set our stuff up, and then hopped on the 4 wheeler to go for a ride and to see if we could find a lake to fish. We ended up coming upon a place called 6 Mile Pond. We happened to get there as the sun was setting. There were fish jumping everywhere! We caught a whole bunch of rainbows. They were tiny, but at least we caught a bunck. We onlystayed for about an hour or so. We wanted to stay longer, but the sun was going down quickly and we starving so we wanted to hurry back to our campsite. We got back to camp and roasted hotdogs and sat around the fire for a very long time. I don't know what it is about fires, but we can just seem to stare at them for hours.

The next morning, we woke up to three dear walking around our tent. We could hear them walking around, so we got up to look at them. Manny wanted to fish ALL day long on Saturday, so I told him that was fine with me. We knew that we were in the middle of quite a few lakes. First, we went for a ride around the area to check it out a little bit more. We discovered an old mine shaft or something. There were a bunch of really big muskrats climbing all over it...gross.

Can you see the muskrat?

What a flattering picture.

Then we rode over to Ferron Reservoir which was a little ways away to see if we could catch some fish. We were hoping to have as good of luck as the night before.

Ferron Reservoir

I didn't have any luck at all, but Manny did.

Manny was catching brook trouts. They were a little small, but at least he was catching something.

I got sick of it (actually, I got mad) after awhile because I wasn't catching anything, so we left and drove farther up the trail and found Willow Pond. I had much better luck there. We both caught a lot. I was happy that things were finally turning around for me. After about another hour or so, we were hungry for lunch so we turned around and went back to our camp site. We wanted to stay longer and try out a few other ponds that we had past, but it was so late in the afternoon that we knew we probably wouldn't be able to catch anything. Plus, we were tired and extremely dirty. The trail we had been on all day was really dry and dusty and we were both covered from head to toe in dirt. I was going to take a picture of Manny to show how dirty we were, but I never did.

I'm glad that Manny decided to go camping at the last minute. It was so peaceful and quiet. I love spending time with him out in mountains. It's always so relaxing, and I that it makes Manny really happy, which makes me happy.

I amlost forgot, on our way home, we passed an Elk ranch, so we stopped to take some pictures. They're not that great, there were so many of them that it was hard to fit them all in one picture. There were some really big ones out there.

CAMPING

Last weekend, Manny and I went camping up Fairview Canyon. We LOVE camping, but we didn't pick the best weekend to go. It was the opening of the bow hunt and EVERY available campsite was taken up. Fortunately, we were able to finally find a nice little spot. Right as we pulled in, I turned and there were 3 bucks standing right next to our campground.

This really isn't the best picture. I was trying to get close to snap a good one, but they took off up the road.

The next morning, we drove to Joe's Valley to do some fishing. That is one of my favorite places to go. It's so big and such a pretty lake. It's also very quiet and hardly anyone is ever there. The fishing pretty much sucked though. I caught a fish on my 3rd cast...and then that was it. No one else caught a single thing.

Joe's Valley

Nick, Jarron, Ryan (L to R)

I did manage to catch some wild turkeys.

My nephews Nick and Ryan, and their cousin Jarron were bummed about not catching anything.

We decided to head over to Potter's Pond to see if we would have any luck there. Ryan and Manny both had an albino on twice, but managed to get off. Again, no one was having any luck, so after a while we decided to head back home, and my brother in-law and his kids went back to their campsight. Hopefully they had more luck later that that night or the next day. Although we only caught one fish, I still had fun fishing and camping.

Manny out on Potter's Pond. He was telling Ryan to get up and get his pole because he had a bite. He was so sad the fish got off.