Christmas With a 2 Year Old

Christmas is AWESOME with a 2 year old.  I feel like a giddy little kid all over again.  This has been such a fun year with her.  This was the first year ever I have put up the Christmas tree before Thanksgiving.  I am usually so against it, but she insisted and I couldn't say no.

We also jumped on the Elf on the Shelf bandwagon.  It is so fun to see her get excited to look for Ralphy every morning.  

We have gone to see Santa 3 times now at the mall.  She is definitely not shy.  By any means.  She hopped right up on his lap and talked poor Santa's ear off.  Each time Santa asks her what she wants for Christmas she says something different.  So far she has asked for a toy box, candy and a monster.  I don't know where she came up with a monster.  This is her mailing Santa's letter.

She wears her Santa hat non-stop.  

Watching Christmas movies has been the only way I can get a snuggle out of this girl.  These moments are rare.

There are a lot of things I love about Tyler's new job, but the best so far has been his two week vacation they have given him.  I love every second of it.  I am one lucky girl to call this guy mine.

Great Gatsby Christmas Party

Tyler has been working at a company called Qualtrics for the past month and he loves it.  Their office is down in Provo, so it's a really good thing we don't live up in Layton anymore.  Even though I miss that little house of ours (especially around Christmas) it is a good thing that we decided to sell it when we did.  Tyler and I were talking the other day and we figured out that in the 5 years we have been married we have lived in 5 different places.  And since right now we are renting until we figure out where we are going to end up it will be up to 6 by next year I am sure.  I love change, but I am so sick of moving.  I actually haven't even hung any pictures or decorations on the walls yet except this one in P's room....

which now I realize that I haven't even taken a picture of it hung up.  All the decorating and work I did on our house in Layton just took it all out of me I guess.  And it seems pointless to put up decorations when we might be moving in 6-9 months anyway.

So anyways....Tyler's work had a Christmas party that was Great Gatsby themed.  It was so fun to dress up.  I rarely ever dress up for Halloween so I have absolutely no costumes on hand.  I decided to go to a costume shop and I was able to find so many cute dresses and accessories there.  Here are some pictures from the night.  Ty's work went all out with the decorations.  They even had 2 old vintage cars parked in the foyer.

Oh and the entertainment of the night was good old Brian McKnight.  It brought me back to my middle school days and church dances.  His hit song "Back At One" was one of my favs back in the day.    

Such a fun night.

Courtesy Knock

It's been a while since I've had any good sleep talking stories to tell, but now that I'm almost in my third trimester I swear I wake up 5 times a night.  So that means more sleep talking stories to come. 

Here are a few of our conversations:

Convo #1

Tyler: Court did you make sure to do the courtesy knock?

Me: No I forgot, did you?

Tyler: No, but I really need to.

Me: What is a courtesy knock?

Tyler: You know.....(long dramatic pause) like the courtesy flush.  So you don't reek up the place.  But instead of flushing you knock.

Me: If you don't flush don't you end up reeking up the bathroom anyway.

Tyler: Courtney...you obviously don't get the courtesy knock.  Talk to me when you are older and understand.

Me: Well what do you knock on?

Tyler: The toilet of course. 

Convo #2

Tyler: Court!  Hurry!  You gotta clear out some space.

Me: Why?

Tyler: The crazy ladies are coming in.

Me: What crazy ladies?

Tyler: The ones from the phones.  They're pretty crazy...you definitely don't want to make them mad.  Just do it.  Trust me Court.

Oh how I love my sleep talking husband!  Does anybody else have spouses that are like this?

Turkey Day

Last year I hosted Thanksgiving for the first time.  It was so much fun, but a lot of work.  This year was nice because we got to attend two different Thanksgiving dinners.  One with my family and one with Tyler's.  I didn't have to cook a turkey or worry about table settings.  It was very laid back and I loved every second of it.  I did do the mashed potatoes and gravy but my mom did the brunt of the work.  She is an AMAZING cook.

We can't have a Ballif family get together and not play a game of settlers.  Tyler won of course.

Payton with Papa & Nona.  We were so glad they came up from Las Vegas.

 Now that Payton is older I decided to start a family tradition that helps us remember the true meaning of Thanksgiving.  Every day for the month of November we wrote something that we were thankful for.  I know a lot of people do the tree and "thankful" leaves but I wanted to make it easy on myself.  I just cut out 3 different color slips of paper for each of the 30 days.  Then on December 1st we dump out the container and read them all.  I'm going to save them all for each year.  Hopefully it will be a cool tradition to help us remember how blessed we are.

Most of the time she would just scribble on her paper.  When I asked her what she was thankful for about 50% of the time she said "me" as in herself.  Haha.  To say she has confidence is an understatement.  Whenever people tell her that she is cute she responds by saying "I am!"  I swear I didn't teach her that.  

Our Little Getaway

We were fortunate enough to be able to go on a trip just the two of us before the new baby comes in 4 months.  Tyler got a new job working for a company called Qualtrics and he wasn't going to start for a week so we quickly planned a week getaway to California.  My amazing mom agreed to watch Payton and we took off.

Last year we took Payton with us to San Clemente and fell in love with the small quaint beach town.  We wanted to go back and visit some of our favorite places there, but we also wanted to try somewhere new.  We found this awesome VRBO in Dana Point close to the beach which is just a little north of San Clemente.

I highly recommend going to the Dana Point Beach if you are ever in Southern California.  It is not super popular so it isn't crowded and the beaches are awesome.

We rented paddle boards one day and paddled around the harbor.  It was really fun.   

We brought a little lunch with us one our boards the second time out and ate lunch in the middle of the harbor.  

Another day we rented a Vespa scooter and rode from Newport beach up to Huntington beach and walked around the piers and shops.  It was so fun!  The weather was amazing there.  In November it got into the mid 80's.  

Walking around Balboa Pier

Sunset on Balboa Island

Tyler is obsessed with fresh seafood (particularly oysters, clams, mussels and anythings raw).  Not my cup of tea.  We went to Fisherman's on San Clemente Pier and watched the sunset while Tyler got his own personal bucket of mussels.  

Our last full day there we went to Laguna Beach to walk around before dinner.  

We found this AMAZING restaurant in Laguna called Nick's.  Seriously if you are ever in Southern California you HAVE to go there.  It is the best meal I have had in a really long time.  I have Celiac disease and can't eat any gluten so it is hard for me to find restaurants to eat out at.  Nick's Restaurant was awesome and were really good about preparing my food.  Tyler ordered top sirloin with mashed potatoes and I just got a cheeseburger (wrapped in lettuce) and fries which I know doesn't sound that special, but Tyler ended up eating more of my meal then his.  The burger was AMAZING! And the view from our table wasn't too bad either.

All in all it was an amazing trip, thanks to my awesome mom for making it possible.  Until next time California.  We will miss you and your sunny weather.

Beautiful Fall

This fall has been absolutely beautiful.  The weather has been so mild and we have been able to go out and do a lot of fun things with Payton.  She is finally at an age where she really enjoys the fun family outings we go on and she is so much fun to watch.

We were able to go to a local pumpkin patch & pick pumpkins to take home and paint.

We went to a fall carnival where Payton got to ride a pony and get her face painted.  She was in heaven.

We went to Cornbelly's where Payton went on her first hayride and she played her little heart out.

We took the train downtown for dinner and a little fun at City Creek.

Tyler went hunting and shot a 4 point deer.

Payton had her second Trick or Treating experience as Tinkerbell.  We were showing her a video of when she went last year to remind her how to do it and we noticed she was wearing gloves and tons of layers.  This Halloween was beautiful.  No layers necessary.