Friday, February 27, 2015

The Rest of 2014.... St. George and New Year's!

 Alrighty! I'm smashing everything from the remainder of 2014 into one post just to be done! We had a terrific rest of our year and partied hardy while we were still all out of school. Because we knew as soon as school started up again, it would be awhile before we were able to have some fun since Andy and I would be starting up again as well.

Anyway... Santa gave us a fun trip to St. George for our family gift this year. We stayed at the Sports Village Condos and it was very, very fun. Santa wanted to give us this gift so we could just be together, relax, and enjoy each others company. We had all had a bit of a rough few months with everything going on and we just wanted to get away to be together and focus on our family.

 It snowed almost all the way down and was a beautiful, quick drive. I don't remember if I mentioned that we finally bought a new car in December (an Acura MDX) and sold our Maxima. We couldn't let go of The Beast quite yet, but it's only a matter of time...
 Anyway, it was nice to drive in our comfy, cozy new car that has a dvd player for the kids.

We arrived Sunday evening and headed to Andy's sister, Jenny's house. The cousins were thrilled to see each other and it was fun to hang out and catch up.

We slept in Monday morning while the kids watched a movie. After our late morning brunch we headed to the indoor pool and spent a few hours swimming.



We tried the new donut plant, Fractured Prune. It was pretty good, but I prefer other donuts more.

We cooked all of our meals at the condo and after dinner one night we had a monopoly tournament. Jonah had received it for Christmas and none of them had ever played. It was so much fun. I think it lasted past midnight and went on for almost 5 hours!

Mag played his new Christmas gift and ended up falling asleep on the couch.

The next day we started out with more relaxing and movies.
  And then we needed more treats.


We went to the temple visitor center and had a fun tour about forever families. It was perfect.


We headed back to the condo complex where we played pool, air hockey, mini golf, and ping pong for a couple hours. There is a clubhouse with all sorts of fun things to do. They also have a heated pool, but Andy and I passed. The older four kids went and swam while I made dinner and they said it was so warm.



 That night the kids got invited to spend the night at Jenny's house with their cousins, so we took them over there. Andy and I went shopping and watched a movie.

The next morning we cleaned the condo and headed out to pick up the kids from Jenny's house. They had stayed up until 3 or 4 AM and were simply exhausted. Everyone slept almost all the way home. We made it in only 3.5 hours and didn't even have to stop once!
 We came home on New Year's Eve. We had to get home in time for Andy to work the night shift at work. We were all sad that we wouldn't be spending the holiday with our daddy.

 I snuck in an early little New Year's Kiss.

Our friend's the Heath's had invited us over for a New Year's party. We ate a ton of food, played a ton of funny games, and the kids pretty much ran wild. It was a great night.


Celebrating the New Year! Right after this, they all ran around outside yelling and screaming and banging pots and pans while all of the parents hugged.


I love these ladies so much. They have become such dear friends to me. 

 So, it was a happy New Year indeed.

The next morning (even though this is January 1st, I'm including it!) we were up bright and early for the Dillard's sale. Oh man, between the 4 of us (we each have 5 kids!) we spent about $2000. I think we bought around 25 pairs of shoes too. It was fun and crazy.

And I forgot to post this earlier, but it's the damage Rachel and I did shopping the day after Christmas. I love sales and I love shopping. What can I say?!

It was a fun and happy rest of the year. And we are ready to take on this year! Even though we are already 2 months in... ;)

Happy New Year!

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