10 Year Anniversary

So, Kevin & I celebrated our 10 year anniversary on January 8th! I can't believe it's been 10 whole years, but at the same time, I can hardly remember what life was like before I married Kevin.
This year, we decided to just stay here locally since we have been trying to upgrade our kitchen a little bit, and we're going on a cruise in March, so that will kind of be our official "Anniversary trip".
So on Thursday, January 7, Kevin took me to dinner at PF Changs, then to the Inn on the Hill in Salt Lake City. It's just off of State Street near the capitol. It had beautiful views of the Salt Lake Temple. I was a dork and forgot to bring my camera, but here are a few pics from my cell phone. This place is over 100 years old, and it was really cool! Look at the website's pics. They're much better than these!
This is the lobby area. There were quite a few fireplaces in this house. I also heard this place is haunted. I kept waking up during the night looking for ghosts. Didn't see any.




This was our yummy breakfast!! It was deee-lish!


On Friday, we toured the Family History Library where Kevin's dad works, went to the top of the Church office building, ran a couple more errands, then went & picked up the kids. That night we ate dinner at Texas Roadhouse.

Thanks to everyone who helped watch our kids!

Happy 10 years, Kev. I love you!! I can't wait for the next 10!

2010 Goals

I have a list of goals I want to work on this year. I don't usually make new year's resolutions. I think I did once or twice, but I didn't write them down, so I don't remember if I completed them or not! I do like to set goals for myself though.
This year, I thought I'd write down the "goals" I want to complete, and it will be interesting to check it in December and see how I did! I'm writing this for my own journaling purposes, so you may or may not care to read on. (And these are in no particular order):

In 2010, I want to:

*Use less plastic bags. I always recycle every single one of my used Wal-Mart sacks, and man, they pile up fast! Although it's good to recycle, it's even better to not use them in the first place. I bought those cloth bags months ago and have only remembered to take them to the store like twice. They sat on my dryer for months, but they have moved their way to the back of my car. But I STILL forget to take them out when I get there! I need to work on that.

*Go visiting teaching EVERY month. I am horrible right now. I used to go faithfully, and I can't take credit for that. It was the wonderful sisters in the ward who took initiative and always called me first. But I HAVE talked to my VT partner, and we are planning on going next week for the first time since we've been put together.

*Run the Salt Lake Half Marathon faster than I did in 2007.

*Complete the Spring Sprint Tri faster than I did in 2009.

*Go to the temple at least once a month with Kevin. I can't believe I've been to the open houses of TWO new temples and haven't even taken the opportunity to go there with my husband since they officially opened. That's just plain sad. There are people in other parts of the world who would give everything to have just one temple within a days travel, and here we have bunches of them.

*Plan out my menus more often, and do at LEAST a week at a time. I know some people who plan out a whole month of dinners in advance. Wow. Maybe I'll get to that point someday, but for now, I'm going to work on planning one week at a time. Which leads me to my next goal:

*Make more freezer dinners!! It's not too hard to just double the recipe and freeze half of it. It just takes a little extra planning. It would make my life so much easier.

*Shoot at least 7 weddings in 2010. I don't know where I got that number. It just keeps popping up in my head. If I get more than 7, I'll be ecstatic!

*Have our own FHE more regularly. We go to FHE with Kevin's whole side of the family every first Monday of the month, but our own FHE has been lacking.


I have a couple of other "private" goals as well, but I'd rather not post them. I'll let you know if I accomplish them! ;)

Here's to 2010!

The end of 2009.....in a nutshell

Okay, I want to make all of my 2009 blog posts into a blurb book, so I'm finishing off all of my 2009 photos and fun events in one HUGE blog post, and here it is:
In late November, the kids had a fun little "campout" in their room. Here's a fun pic:



On November 30, we went to see the lights at temple square for FHE:





On December 1, Ryker graduated from his crib to a big boy bed!


Here are the girls reading Christmas books the day we set the tree up, December 3, 2009..



Here are the kids sitting on Santa's lap at the Ward Christmas brunch, December 5, 2009:



And at FHE at the Chapman's, December 6, 2009:



Here's a shot of one of our Christmas cards from this year:

And I was able to even shoot a couple of weddings in December.......



Here are the girls singing in their Elementary School program, December 17, 2009:



Here are some of the shots from the "Adorable Baby Contest" I entered Ryker in. You can still vote, by the way, even if you already have. He's running behind! :( Go to http://rltphotography.blogspot.com/ to vote!! I think voting is open thru January 8th. 3 more days!

For FHE on December 21, we had some friends over and we decorated Gingerbread houses!

And this is Christmas Eve. The cookies and milk are out for Santa, with a few carrots for the reindeer. Bailee wrote a last-minute list, to make sure he knew what she wanted.

And here are a few shots from Christmas morning. Don't mind the raggedy hair styles, it was Christmas!!

And here is the mess after all the presents were open. It took days to get it clean again!

Here is my gift from Kevin:



And we got to go to two New Years eve parties! I didn't take pics at the first one, (sorry, Frank & Heidi!), but here are a couple from the second party at Ty & Shannon's. We played Rock Band and had a wonderful time! Happy 2010!!!

Sledding!!

We have a wonderful sledding hill within walking distance to our house. Here are some clips from Christmas Day, trying out the new sleds from Santa!