Civil Rights

I love holidays- I love holidays even more when it means you can celebrate with a day off of school (which never happens in college). It was once known as Martin Luther King day, but this year I discovered that they changed it to Civil Rights day. Why? I am not quite sure, but either way I am grateful for civil rights.

In celebration, we went cross-country skiing up to Mesa Falls (last date recap) with some of our friends. The weather was beautiful. (It wasn't -20 and snowing, so I was happy.) Once we got to Mesa Falls the sight was un.real. The falls were almost all ice, and it was breathtaking. Robert went out onto the ice (which I didn't get a picture of), but it cracked and he almost died.

Sitting on the bench was actually more like sitting on the ground.

After our cross-country skiing adventure we had some other friends over for dinner! Yay for delicious risotto and great company. They had a baby cute 5 month baby girl, and she is just the sweetest thing, ever.

Happy Civil Rights/Martin Luther King Day!

Family Pictures

This year we took family pictures. With two of my sisters having superb child making qualities combined with my impressive mate catching skills- our family pictures were a little out dated.

The first thing that my dad's clients (or his unforgiving daughters) make fun of  see when they walk into his office an overly large portrait of my mother that looks eerily as if the producers of Napoleon Dynamite used my mom as a model for  the "Portrait's by Deb" logo. 

We convinced our photographer to take non-glamour shots of my mother.

So, there was one success. On the other hand, somehow the photographer knew that may or may not have the tendency to openly silently mock cheesy and awkward engagement pictures. 

Who thought this was a good idea, I don't know. Before I knew it the photographer was telling me to straddle Robert and karma was catching up to me. 

worst.idea.ever.

After a year and a half of marriage, we clearly look like different people. So, now we have something to replace our "young-in" engagement pictures.

Family pictures always end up with a few gems, so here are my favorite awkward pictures: (apart from the previous straddling)

My mom's face (or lack thereof) sums up the past thirty years. "why oh why did I end up with 6 daughters who all have first child syndrome?". That's what two oldest children get for marrying each other. 6 oldest children.

Now in all seriousness, here are our real, noteworthy family pictures:

The Elliotts

Pappy-La-Pue & Mammie

 Call's

 The Family

 Purcell's 

(notice Emerson's incredible ability to stare down anyone.....you'll never guess who he got that from)

 Grandchildren

 Original Wixom's

 Wixom Women. 

 Sisters.

And here is to my parents for having quite the lovely gene pool.

A Merry Little Christmas

After a long week of finals, Robert and I barely made our standby flight to Vegas (thanks to my awesome brother-in-law, Mark). I finally got to meet my two new nephews, Darwin and Emerson. We respectfully refer to them as Winston (Churchill) and Elvis. 

Collette may or may not have taught D to have some serious hair envy. 

And Natalie taught Emerson to be protective of his locks.

This year we spent Christmas with my family, and since we don't all fit in a house anymore, we all head up to a cabin in Utah to spend the week. It was a perfect week, filled with tree hunting, sledding, snow and games (Justin is an avid board gamer, and brings a suitcase just for games.)

  Christmas Eve arrived, and we spent the afternoon going on a 4 mile snow run (co, dad, robert and I), playing minute-to-win-it games, and Christmas Palooza.

Christmas Palooza is our Christmas Eve dinner where each person makes a dish from somewhere in the world they have been. We had everything from Romanian Sarmale, Italian Zuppa Toscana, German Cabbage, Poutine to Finnish Cardamom Bread. 

The nativity was acted out, pajamas were opened, and cookies, milk and carrots were put out for Santa.

And then...... the adults played our White Elephant game. The epic return of handerpants, an iPlunge, Cat Naps calendar..... it was epic.

Overall, it was a wonderful Christmas, and I was glad Robert was able to spend his first Christmas with the Wixoms. Second Christmas down...... a lot more to go :)

We are now back up in the frozen tundra of Rexburg, being greeted with -8 degree weather. It is our last semester of school, and we are both ready to graduate in April! We are heading out with a bang....Robert is taking 17 credits, and I am taking 19. Chances are the blog will take back seat, again.