Thursday, January 8, 2009

Our Busy Holiday


So for all those people who might planning to get married over Christmas break I would say try to do it before or after. I know because we got married over Christmas break. 66 couples got married that day, Dec 28, 2004, in the Salt Lake Temple. Here's a photo.




Anyway, that was my disclaimer you will soon see why this makes for a crazy holiday break.
So we spent the Holidays with Ben's Family in Redmond. We shared talents and sang songs.

Most of the cousins were together in their Christmas PJs (we are missing here Hally and Alec). So its from left to right, Annie, Olivia, Hannah holding Sam, Maddie holding Violet, Claire, Ella, Ginny, Sophie and Anika! Phew I did it! And two more on the way.


I made a pyramid with the Williams girls and Ginny.
We even Enjoyed a white Christmas
And it was nice to spend lots of time with Daddy


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Then on the 27th Ben and I left for our anniversary getaway to Winthrop, Washington. We stayed at the Sun Mountain Lodge. Here's a map.

At the lodge we enjoyed the great scenery of the Methow valley, luxurious accommodations, snowshoeing, and a four diamond dinner (yes the dining room is rated with four diamonds! That's kind of a big deal). Here are some pictures of us snowshoeing. This is Ben in front of the some nice scenery.

Here Bri poses in front of the lodge area. Our building is on the right hidden behind the tree a bit.

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After enjoying the winter paradise of Winthrop for a few days we headed to the Tri-Cities, Ben's ancestral homeland, for Chud's Wedding. Chud is Ben's friend from High School. We picked up the girls in Cle Elum (from Bri's mom, Thanks Nori!) and headed to the Maxfields parents' house in West Richland. Ginny was thrilled to be with her BFF Riley. She also enjoyed a visit to the Columbia River Washington Temple. We attended a temple session while the girls played with the Maxfield girls.


We had a little reunion of high school friends at the wedding reception. The napkins have picture of Keith and Josh, who were conspicuously absent.


Congrats to the Happy couple!


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Back at home we had a small New Years gathering.


Seattle fireworks off the space needle at midnight. It was nice even though we were getting dripped on. Gotta love Seattle!

The group; we enjoy playing lots of games. Thanks cool dudes.
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And the final event was my cousin Ali's Wedding. Here are my two aunts and my mom out front the temple after the sealing.


This is me with the groom at the luncheon

Here is the cake at the reception. Can you say chocolate ganache!
April is a girl after my own heart.

Here they are dancing


We danced practically all night! It was a lot of fun.
Here is a photo of the cool people. Mary, Mandi, Me and Lil'.
It was a great time and I am sad that my other fox ladies couldn't come. Hopefully a family reunion will happen soon.


So as you can see not a lot of time for relaxing when Christmas and New Years scrunch your anniversary. But hey we sure had a great time.

5 comments:

Shaela said...

wow, what a BUSY time of year for you!! looks like you had a lot of good times though. John and I have our 6th anniversary in February, and we're going snowshoeing, too! :) gotta love free weekend babysitters.

kilaMOMjaro said...

I love BEING a free weekend babysitter. =]

Leslie said...

I didn't know Ali was getting married!! That's awesome. And I'm actually not sure I knew he was your cousin... but maybe I did... ANYWAY!!! You guys are adorable and we need to get together again!

-Leslie

Candace said...

Looks like you guys had an amazing holiday! Your girls are SO grown up and SO darn cute!!! Definitely your little look-a-likes!

NW Varneys said...

So I see you've taken up drinking since we left Seattle. lol j/k. Thanks for commenting on our blog--I miss you, too! Hopefully I will come visit sometime in the next month or so. I wish I could make it for the stampin up party, but it doesn't look likely. DO keep me inviting me to those kinds of things, though--you never know! Take care and love ya! ~Julie
PS I love the icon of giraffia!