Christmas!!

This year Nick and I spent Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with his family in Alpine. His sister Emily, her husband Logan, and their baby Sophie were up visiting from Seattle. It was a blast!
Emily is an amazing cupcake decorator, so while she made her awesome cupcakes, Nick and I made sugar cookies. I had never made sugar cookies before and I had so much fun doing it! Everyone helped us frost them, which is a good because there were so many cookies!!
After making the cupcakes/cookies we ate a delicious dinner prepared by Nick's fabulous mother. It was delicious!
Little did I know what awaited me after dinner...a Goodrich family tradition that I had no clue existed. Every Christmas Eve, Nick's family well, let's just say that it's basically a giant family talent show. It was so much fun to watch everyone show off, and it's a GREAT thing that I was exempt this year (for lack of knowing of the tradition) because each and every person in my new family has more talent in their little finger nails than I do in my entire body. Seriously, I was blown away. I am going to have to find a new talent this year or face being humiliated in front of my own family! Logan sang a song, while Emily played the piano, Laura played her harp, and then Emily sang a song while Doug played the piano. Doug is an amazing sight reader! Wow, I was extremely impressed by everyone. I also found out that Nick still possesses a talent that I didn't know he could still do, he can play the saxophone. He hasn't picked up a saxophone in eight years and after just a few warm up notes, whipped out an entire song! I was amazed!

Nick playing "O Holy Night"

Em and Doug - "Breathe of Heaven"

After everyone finished showing off their fabulous musical talents, we listened to The Polar Express on tape. Then we got our "first gift of Christmas", which was Pj's.
After that everyone started to settle down. The presents were all put under the tree and it was off to bed. Even though I was too excited to sleep...
Oh, and just so you all know, Nick's family doesn't get excited about Christmas. Laura told me that they usually wake up around 10, eat breakfast, then open the presents, and if any of you know me, that is literally impossible for me to stand. So I convinced everyone to wake up at nine, open presents and then eat breakfast, which worked out just great! And Doug promised he would get excited about Christmas with me, so that was good too. Thanks Doug!

It snowed all morning...and kept snowing. It never stopped and they probably had about a foot of fresh snow by the time Nick and I left to hit up the Jewkes' Christmas celebration!
It was held at Aunt Julie's house this year. Missy, Alex, and their daughter Elsa flew up for the holidays from Ohio so my whole family made the venture down to Sandy. It was so much fun to have everyone together for Christmas again like the old days! It was especially great to see Missy again and meet Elsa for the very first time! She is such a little princess! She was dancing around the living room singing songs from sleeping beauty and playing with her new princess dolls. She also was convinced that my brother Jesse was her Prince Charming, and was attached to him the whole night! It was so much fun!

As I mentioned earlier, it kept snowing, and snowing. By the time we left it was basically a white out. The roads were super slick, and since my car wouldn't start (long story) we had to leave it in Alpine and borrow Nick's family's Suburban to make the trek to Aunt Julie's. We headed back to Alpine and the roads were a mess! When we got to the Alpine Highway, a cop informed us that there had been a terrible accident and they had to close the road. We got back on the slick freeway and took an alternate route. By the time we got there, the roads were so terrible and my car still wouldn't start, so we ended up spending the night at Nick's parents house again. We woke up early the next morning (5:45) because Nick had to work. Luckily my car decided to start! We headed home, Nick went off to work, and I cleaned the house. Lucky me. All in all, it was a great Christmas and although it was a little scary and weird to be spending it with a new family who had different traditions, I had a blast!
Merry Christmas everyone!
**I know the videos of Nick/Doug and Em aren't working...i'm trying to figure it out, it's being difficult.

Christmas at Temple Square!

Last year I was so upset that Nick and I never got around to going to see the lights at Christmas square, so this year we promised ourselves we would go. So on the 23rd off we went. It was freezing cold and snowed the whole time. Even the hot cocoa we got before we went didn't help keep us warm while we were walking around. Luckily it was beautiful enough to keep us from complaining too much! Since there are so many pictures, I decided to use my newest blogging skills and make another slide show! In fact, the next few posts will probably have them because I went a little picture crazy over the holidays!!

Honeymoon Pictures

I know that I've posted a few of these pictures before, but I never got around to posting the rest of the pictures from our honeymoon. I finally figured out how to do the slideshow thing and figured this would be a great way to test it out!

Nick and I met in Juneau, Alaska while we were both up there working the summer of 2007. We met at a bonfire on a beach and immediately hit it off! We dated for about a year before Nick and I decided to get married. We consider Juneau to be our home away from home and absolutely love it there, which is why we chose to honeymoon in Juneau.

The first "real" snow

I know I've been blog crazy this week, but I just wanted to post an update on Juno.
December 13th was the first REAL snow of the season, and despite Juno's first hesitations, she ended up loving it!
Nick and I are very lucky to still have Juno with us. Last week on Monday night, Juno went into Anaphylactic shock after having an allergic reaction to one of her immunizations. We gave her a home vaccination to try to save some money, and within the first five minutes of giving it to her, Juno started to pant (which she never does), drool, lose bowl control, and her back legs went paralyzed. We took her to one of the late night animal emergency clinics near our house. They told us what happened, gave her some shots of steroids and antihistamines and sent her home. It took her a couple of days to get back to her usual puppy self, but we finally have our Juno back!
Here's the proof!

We "Elf"ed ourselves!

We decided to follow the Christmas trend and Elf-ourselves!
Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Our first Christmas Tree!

Last weekend, Nick and I decided that since our only Christmas decoration was a bowl of green and red M&M's (below), we were desperately lacking in the Christmas decoration department. Our solution: a tree! There was one major problem though...we didn't have a tree, or any decorations to put on it.We thought about getting a real tree this year, but then I remembered that my sister had told me they had pretty cheap fake trees at Wal-Mart. So off we went to buy a tree! We ended up getting one for $35. Even though it's pretty small and dinky, it fits perfectly in our small dungeon.
As for decorations, we headed to Mom and Dad Goodrich's house. Nick's family has a very awesome Christmas tradition (that we will be continuing in our family) where every year they get a few ornaments that depict something each family member accomplished that year. Thanks to Nick's amazing mother and father, we had the whole collection of Nick's ornaments to put on our tree! Although it's not quite as full as either of us would like, I think for our first Christmas together we are off to a good start!Thanks for all the help Jenny, Val, and Gary!
Oh, and Jenny, we still need to make some more ornaments before Christmas. The clock is ticking...

These are some of my favorite ornaments:

Harry Potter and his magic wand.

This is an ornament from Juneau, AK the summer we were dating.

This is a picture of little Nick! It looks like one of the ornaments you make in 2nd grade, absolutely adorable! Isn't my husband so cute?!

This is a backpacking Santa, his feet wiggle around!

Pearl!

I have the most adorable niece in the world! These are some videos I took the day Jenny, Jeff, and Pearl came over to our apartment to watch the BYU vs. UTES football game.



This first video is of Pearl pretending to be a dog. At one point, she fell flat on her face and Juno thought she was playing with her! It was hilarious.



These are Pearl's awesome dancing moves! Go Pearl!

Go Utes!

Yesterday, in anticipation for the upcoming rivalry game between U of U and BYU, Nick and I decided to get new sweatshirts to show support for our team! Nick's old mission companion, Joe Ascuito (aka Squito), comes over every Tuesday and Thursday to work on physics assignments with Nick. Yesterday, it just so happend that we were all showing our true colors and support for our team!

Even little Juno got in on the fun and actually had quite a comfortable time in her cozy Utes sweatshirt...until she tried to walk around in it! It's a little big for her, but we are gonig to get her a smaller one so she can support the Utes along with us!

Our family bleeds red, does yours? GO UTES!!

Games

So the game is...take the 5th album of pictures from your computer and post the 5th picture in that album.
This a picture Nick took while in Alaska in the summer of 2007. He took this picture before we met, and I have no idea where he took it, but it's gorgeous!!

I tag:
Jenny and Jeff
Bryan and Chandi
Natalee and Brock
Emily and Logan
and ...
Val!

Juno

Yesterday Nick took Juno to the vet because we thought she may have been sick-she's been throwing up for the past couple days. Not a lot, just enough to make us a little worried. The vet said that he thinks it was just because she got into something that she shouldn't have....like eating plastic-which she does all the time. He also said that since the first time we took her to the vet she's gained 10 pounds! She now weighs 37 lbs...what a fatty. :) Juno also has demodex mange, which is caused by a mite that all dogs have, however, sometimes when a dog's immune system gets compromised, they can't control the mite population and they get mange. Juno has a localized case, which means she only has a few spots and more than likely they will all clear up as she gets her adult immune system. The vet said that the mange looked much better this time than it did last time and he is very optimistic about a full recovery without any treatment! Yay! The vet also told Nick that for a pit bull, juno is very small. He doesn't think she will get any bigger other than bulk out a little more. Nick and I love Juno to death and couldn't be more excited to have her in the family and know that she is doing much better since we adopted her! She has even started to act like a puppy-she loves to play with her tug toy and tennis balls. She also loves to show Nick and I affection now! She still isn't much of a licker, but she does put her paws on you and wag her tail when she wants you to pay attention to her!

We love you Juno!

This is how Juno sleeps! Crazy dog!

Juno's first snow!

A Spook-Tacular Halloween Party

Tonight was the Halloween spook-tacular Jewkes family party. Every year my (Kim's) family gets together for food, pumpkin carving, costumes, laughs, and fun. After Nick got off work we swiftly put on our costumes and headed over to Aunt Denise's house.

Nick and I went in true Lord of the Rings fashion as a hobbit and an elf.

When we got there Aunt Denise had a wonderful dinner waiting for us. Clam Chowder, cheesy potato soup, homemade dog-bone bread sticks, spider eyes, brains, and witch's brew were on the menu. It was delicious! And the decorations were very spook-tacular!

Everyone had on great costumes! But I think the winners of the costume contest would have to be Jay as Santa Clause on vacation, or baby Carver the dinosaur (and definitely the cutest person there, aside from Pearl of course).
After our delicious dinner, the pumpkin carving began! It was a very messy and very crazy, but loads of fun! Everyone took their turn carving a pumpkin (or two, or three). Even the little cousins who could only stick knives and toothpicks in the sides took their turn!

Jenny and Jeff won the biggest pumpkin contest with their giant homegrown pumpkin! It was huge!

Even crazy cousin Zac got in on the giant pumpkin fun as "Mr. Pumpkin Head"!After the buckets of guts were full and nearly every pumpkin was carved, the night came to an end with the lighting of the pumpkins! They looked great and took up all of Aunt Denise's back stairs...now that's a lot of pumpkins!

The Jewkes family Halloween parties are always great and Nick and I are looking forward to the Goodrich Halloween extravaganza on Monday! Have a Spook-Tacular Halloween!

First Family Photo

I just thought it would be fun to post our first family picture since Juno came along! It was taken by my beautiful sister Jenny. Thanks Jenny!

The Honeymoon!!

I know that I've been slacking on the whole blog posting thing, but honestly, can you blame me? Being newlyweds and trying to go to school and work at the same time is quite a challenge! Anyway, I figured it was about time we get some stuff posted about our fabulous honeymoon in Juneau, Alaska.
...it all started with quite the adventure, and definitely ended the same way!
We were scheduled to fly out of Idaho Falls at 6 o'clock on Saturday morning, so we decided it'd be easier to drive to the airport the night before and sleep there until our flight left. When we got there, we realized that definitely wasn't the best idea...we were the only two people in the entire airport! If it wasn't for a janitor emptying the garbage outside the doors, we wouldn't have even been able to get in!

After transferring planes 3 more times, and many hours later, we finally arrived in Alaska! As is the norm in Juneau, it was raining!
We spent the first few nights at Silverbow Inn. It's an inn/bakery and they had absolutely amazing service! They had a little kitchen/dining area that they kept stocked with fresh goods from the bakery, plus we got a discount on the food we ordered too! It was great! Silverbow also holds some special memories for Nick and I - we used to eat breakfast there nearly every morning before work, and that is also where Nick told me he loved me for the first time.
While we spent our amazing week in Juneau, we saw and did so many amazing things! We went hiking up to the tram which has an amazing view of the entire city (when it's not foggy). We also were able to hang out with a bunch of our old friends from last year! We went on some bus tours with Nick's old company ACT. We were able to go to the glacier, the glacier gardens, and the hatchery! Plus whale watching plus a delicious lunch at Orca Point Lodge!


We decided to go to a movie with some of Nick's old coworkers one night, but before we went to the theater, we went bear hunting! It was great! We were able to follow one bear around for about ten minutes. We even saw him catch a fish! ...and on top of that, he got so close to us that he sniffed my foot! That's right, he sniffed my foot!

on our last day in Juneau, we went sea kayaking with my old boss Chana, one of her friends from this year, and our friend Cody who worked with Nick last year. We had a great time, and definitely got a great workout! Although we didn't get attacked by whales this year, it was still a wonderful experience.


We had a wonderful time on our honeymoon and it really felt like going home. Since I haven't quite figured out the slide show thing yet...I'll have to post the rest of the pictures later, but Juneau was beautiful and Nick and I loved every minute of it!


....speaking of Juneau, we have a new addition to our family! A Puppy! We decided to name her Juno. She's an adorable 6 month old pit bull mix. We adopted Juno from the Humane Society of Utah. We'll fill you in later, but here is a picture to get you started! She is SO CUTE!