It Takes Two

Two years of marriage, that is.

In the past year we have:

 

Figured out how funny we are not,

Embarrassingly ALMOST gotten lost,

Said goodbye to a couple missionary friends including Sister Ripplinger, Sister Richey, and Elder Hansen,

Graduated from college!

Jumped out of an airplane,

Became parents for a few months,

Did a LOT of playing,

Went back to school,

and just basically had a grand ole time.

 

We also learned that:

 

Two years of marriage > one year of marriage,

Kolton has an unhealthy fascination with Craigslist,

Jayci has an unhealthy addiction to books,

We both LOVE living in Monteview,

Kolton has zero sense of smell,

Jayci has a supersonic sense of smell,

Kolton makes a pretty good farmer (and looks oh so handsome when he comes home all greasy grimy)

Jayci makes an okay teacher (and is a complete spaz in front of the class)

Kolton can grill up one heck of a steak,

Jayci can mix up a pretty delicious white sauce,

Boating and playing cards are our favorite pasttimes,

Watching Seinfeld at night is also pretty alright too.

Insanity really is insane,

and living in between both sets of parents really has a lot of benefits.

Life is good!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Classy Couples Christmas Party

This year we got a bit crazy and I got together with my friend Andra to plan our very own couples Christmas party. We didn't know if anybody would even come, but thought we'd plan it anyway. I don't have the best track record when it comes to party planning, but I think it was a success. We had quite a few people show up and our house was bursting with food and friends and fun and ugly sweaters. We had a white elephant gift exchange and got such a kick out of all the funny gifts.



Two balloons make a nice redneck boob job!

Hot Flash relief kit

Beans, Gas Relief pills, and an air freshner

An autographed picture of Marsh wakeboarding

A lovely hat

A Shakeweight!

"Home: Where the Ho and Me get together!"
Classy.

It's a...

Christmas Man-Thong!
Also classy.

More men's underwear for the Tomlinsons

The Victoria's Secret bag held nothing more exciting than hand soaps.

Marshall got the fanny-pack!

A magazine full of insider Twilight pictures

Andra scored with a stand up bathroom scale

Lindsey got a useful toiletry kit

 

We had so much fun visiting and laughing and I was so sad when everyone had to leave. I just wanted to party to last all night. But we made sure to get a picture of everyone and their ugly sweaters.

Matt and Breezie

 

Mitch and Lindsey

 

Kaden and Raechel

Jake and Baylee

 



Presli and Brady



Marshall, Andra, and Dawson



Tanner and Alli



Austin and Krystal



Us!

The D.I. sure made a bundle off of us party-goers between the sweaters and the gifts. Thanks to everyone who came! We had such a nice time and hope it will become an annual thing.





O Christmas Tree!

 We got our very first Christmas tree this year. With school last year and just barely being married the year before, other things took priority over a  tree during our previous Christmases as a married couple.

But this year we decided to change all that. School and stuff still kept us pretty busy so we didn't get a tree until midway through the month.

We decided that this year we would chop one down and then maybe buy a fake tree after Christmas and try to get one for sale. I didn't love this plan because when I was younger my family used to chop down trees. We would drive clear up into the mountains and drive and drive and drive until we got stuck in the snow. Then we would chop down the first tree we saw and spend the rest of the day getting unstuck. Wasn't such a fun experience.

 

So I was a little wary when Kolton brought up this idea but thought that it would probably work this year. So we headed off. We jumped in the pickup, grabbed a little jerky (to prove we were really living off the land) and drove into the mountains/hills behind our house. We were surprised by how dry it was up there (no possible chance of us getting stuck in the snow) and even more surprised by how many good trees we saw. There were actually quite a few options that weren't so bad...for a mountain tree, anyway.

 

We walked around for a bit, hiked up and down a couple hills and were pretty indecisive. We actually ended up chopping down two trees before we got back to the pickup. And by we I of course mean Kolton. He chopped down the two trees and then packed them down the hill to the pickup while I had the much more tasking task of carrying the dangerous weapon (the saw) down the hill.

 

When we finally got to the pickup we were pretty happy with our day's work. Then on our way down the mountain we saw THE tree. It was just sitting there on the side of the road beckoning for us to chop her down. So we did. Which brought us up to a total of three trees in the back of our pickup (we ended up giving the other two away). We continued our drive down the mountain even more content with our accomplishments.

 

When we got home we put the tree up right away (twas the middle of December, we had no time to waste!). With a few lights, a couple popcorn strings, and a few thousand strands of tinsel we had our very own Charlie Brown tree. And we love it!

It's quite homemade and cheap (I like to refer to it as "vintage"- that sounds a little fancier, I think.) but it actually looks pretty good when the lights are off. The tinsel really sparkles and looks neat. I think that we are going to nix the fake tree plan and start our own tradition of chopping down our trees because it was quite fun (sans getting stuck).