Home For the Holidays

We were fortunate to be able to go home to Utah and visit for awhile. By the time Sherri got her holiday schedule at work flights home over Christmas were a little too pricey so we opted for the cheaper route and went home the week before. Sherri was there for a week and Shayne was able to stay a few days more (he isn't working and still out of school, so why not) and made it home today just in time to spend Christmas with Sherri. It definitely wasn't long enough but it was sure fun to see all our family and friends.

Sherri's youngest brother, Darren turned the big 16 the week before we went to visit. He waited for us to get there so we could celebrate with him, thanks!! We are sure glad he did that cake was yummy! This card game called Bang was our gift to Darren, it has become a favorite among our close friends and family.

This was the yummy birthday cake Sherri's mom made. We had to post this pic because we realized in all our fun and chaos this is the only pic we took with Sherri's mom in it - she was usually the one snapping the pics. Also, the one pulling the cute face is Sherri's favorite and only sister Christie. Darren got to pick his favorite meal for his birthday. We loved it - BBQ spare ribs! Sherri's mom was the master chef and made a great meal along with the amazing birthday cake - thanks mom! This is Sherri's fam, minus her mom who is taking the pic and then her older brother Steve (he is in Missouri and will not be coming out until closer to Christmas - we will miss seeing them this year, it's not the same when we aren't all together)

It wouldn't be Christmas without a picture with Santa, this is us with Shayne's parents.

A really really big gingerbread house - put ours to shame!!We were able to attend one of Darren's junior jazz games. He is getting quite good and he was fun to watch. Sherri had to post this close up because she just can't get over his muscles (look at those arms) her little brother is growing up it is so weird to see!! We opened presents early with Shayne's parents (Sherri's wanted us to wait until Christmas so we would have more to open since we would be alone) It was fun having presents early and we got spoiled, thanks guys you shouldn't have given us so much! This is Sherri with her kitchen aid mixer she's been wanting! Shayne's parents gave him a play station 3. He has never been big on video games but it might be a nice thing to do when taking a study break. He was more excited about the fact that it can play the new blu-ray dvds! We went to Cabelas (an outdoors/sporting goods/hunting store) with Sherri's parents, it's her Dad's favorite place in the world. We had never been and it was pretty fun to see all the displays. Sherri had to take a picture of one of them. However, this doesn't do it justice you will just have to go see for yourself sometime. We were able to go to dinner with some of the rest of Shayne's fam one night. His 9 nieces and nephews gave us this awesome blanket they made. You can't see it in the pic but they engraved our names in the middle and then wrote Ohio State on one side and U of U on the other (the other side of the blanket is solid red) we absolutely love it - thanks guys! Sherri was able to spend a day with her fam skiing. They had a blast despite the fact that she lost her poles off the chair lift the first run of the day. Always an adventure with us, luckily they were able to recover them and Sherri didn't have to feel like 2 year old skiing down the mountain the whole time with no poles. This is Sherri's 2 brothers and sister and her crazy cousin Bryant (the flourescent one). Shayne opted to stay home because he was supposed to go snowboarding in a few days. It ended up snowing really hard and they closed the canyons so he never got to go, he was pretty bummed but oh well- next time! Just couldn't resist this beautiful picture from the top of one mountain to another. We really do love the snow - it just rains all the time in Columbus. We were fortunate to visit with a lot of friends. We are sad we didn't get pics with most of them but that's ok, we have the memories. This is our favorite little guy - Preston. He is too cute for words. He is the son to some of our good friends - the Kings, guess we forgot to add them in the pic. The Carter's in town from North Carolina The Lujan's in town from Oregon.

It was so fun to visit and see you all, we had a blast and only wish we could have stayed longer. There were still many of you we didn't even get to see, we will catch you next time.

Thanks for the fun times and memories we will see you again soon!