{garett's birthday}

Garett turned 22 this year! He's getting so old ; ) Since I've been such a slacker in the breakfast making department as of late I decided to make him a delicious big breakfast! I ran to the store and got some fixings and came home and went to work. I made loaded scrambled eggs and bacon. Haha Garett ate about 6 or 7 eggs and about half of the package of bacon! Oh and a few glasses of chocolate milk! Needless to say he was uncomfortably full afterwords.

After Garett headed off to school I got really busy! I was throwing a surprise birthday party for him later that night! My list of things to do to prepare: clean our seriously messy house, make a sweet Iron Man cake, wrap his presents, prepare the other snacks, decorate the house and as always, keep Andersen from causing mischief! Yeah, I was biting off more than I could chew.

It took me 2 hours to thoroughly clean the house (I had to get it really clean not only for the party but because I was showing the apartment to some girls who want to buy it). Then I got started on the cake. That took way longer than I expected....about 4 hours! But I think it turned out ok....whenever I have a project I want to do I have an image in my head of what it will look like and unless the finished product resembles that image in my head I will keep working until it does! I'm a recovering perfectionist but I do relapse at times. That was a hard lesson for me to learn...that things can't always be perfect.

Anyway the cake was no where near my mental image but I had no time or energy to fix that. Here was my inspiration from Pinterest. Oh by the way, I decided to throw Garett a surprise IRON MAN birthday party, hence the Iron Man cake.

Pretty cool right?! So I have never made or used fondant. But I thought it couldn't be too hard....haha. I decided to go with a marshmallow fondant that I again found on Pinterest. Click here for the tutorial. From what I hear marshmallow fondant is way easier to work with, is a lot cheaper and tastes way better than original fondant. It is only 3 ingredients: marshmallows, water and powdered sugar. Simple. One thing; it is super super sticky. So when she says lather on the Crisco (on your hands and countertop) do it then add some more!

For the innards of the cake I did 2 layers of red velvet and in the middle a layer of yellow cake. Iron Man colors. Here's my creation.

Yeah I wasn't ambitious enough to construct an Iron Man out of fondant so I bought action figures....new toys for Anders to play with too!

Around 6:45pm friends started to arrive. I went and picked Garett up from school; he thought we were going out to dinner. But when I picked him up I told him that Katrina (Garett's sister who was "babysitting" Anders) said that Anders was getting sick and that we had to run back to the apartment and make sure he was ok. Garett bought my story and he was totally surprised to see a house full of people!

It was a fun party. Our friends the Kirby brought over their Nintendo 64 and we played Mario Kart and Mario Party! Finally we sang to the birthday boy, he blew out his 22 candles and we ate cake!

Not going to lie the cake was delicious. The marshmallow fondant tasted way way better than another fondant I've had. I'd highly recommend it!

After everyone left we opened presents.

From Garett's sister Cheryse's family

Cute note from Cheryse's family!

The Avengers movie and Iron Man phone case from Anders

Sweet key chain from my family

Both Iron Man movies from me : )

Another birthday in the books! And who says you are ever too old to have an Iron Man birthday party?!

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{no motivation...is it the weekend yet?}

Well I knew that this would be a great day when first thing this morning I went grocery shopping and had everything out of the cart and on the conveyor belt when I realized I forgot my blasted wallet....good thing I was way too tired to be super ticked. Last night was awful. Actually the last few nights have been awful. Anders has been sick again and so my nights are looooong. Since Garett is in school and going to be taking mid-terms here soon I don't make him wake up (because he sleeps through anything). Then last night I had this stupid tickle in my throat that makes me feel like I can't fully swallow...warning sign that I am getting sick too. Awesome. What the heck happened to my immune system?! I used to never get sick now I'm sick all the time! Maybe it has something to do with Anders' coughing directly on my eyeball or into my mouth everyday....hmmm not sure.

Thank goodness he's happy today!

So with that great start to the day I literally have no motivation to do anything and I am dead tired. I am sitting here on my couch, just pressed play for the 3rd time for Baby Einstein for Anders, and am blogging my less than lucid thoughts. Here's what's on my mind....

Remember that family room makeover I announced I was doing awhile ago? Well that is no longer happening. Why? We are moving.....upstairs! Hallelujah. I've seriously entertained the thought of harming my upstairs neighbors. They are up at all hours, no joke, all hours, everyday. Their common area is situated directly above our master bedroom and Anders' room. So you can see why their stomping around at all hours is annoying. Garett has gone up there multiple times. Apparently they love to hear the sound of their enormous high heels on their wood floor at 2 in the morning. That's what they were wearing when Garett went up there. But everything we say to them goes in one ear and out the other because it happens every night. I do have something on them though. Since it is BYU housing boys aren't allowed to be over past midnight on weekdays. When Garett went up there at 2am there were boys. Tsk tsk. Next time we go up there and there are boys I am turning them in. I'm not their manager and I'm not the type of person that would normally do that but these girls are driving me up the wall!

So this move is more than welcome! We will be on the third floor with no one above us! It is also a two story apartment. All 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and the laundry room are up stairs. On the main level is the kitchen, family room, dining room and a half bath. I am so excited. The unit is beautiful. We are just planning on repainting all the trim and hopefully the red walls....the accent walls are painted red. I am not a huge fan of red. I really want to paint them a slate grey. I'll have to clear it with my aunt first : )

Also on my mind is my awesome hubby! Every wife should publicly brag about their husbands. It keeps the marriage strong. I love Garett. He is literally my best friend. He is my eternal companion. Knowing that he and I will be together forever (Anders too : ) ) makes even the most crappy days, like today, an wonderful day. I am completely 100% me when I'm with him. And the 100% is not always pretty. Like right now.....my old soccer sweats and over sized soccer shirt are lookin so hot. Right now he's at school. Most days he's there all day. But he's working hard to get into the accounting program at BYU so I will try to be understanding ; ) BYU's accounting program is number one or two (I'm not sure) in the nation! He's finishing up the prerequisites this semester and applying for the program in May. Since he's pretty much 4.0ed all his prerequisites I know he'll get in!

Well Valentine's day is around the corner! I told Garett I'm in charge of dinner this year. Plus he's at school all day Thursday and has a test so he didn't need that extra stress. I've got fun plans! But I can't tell you because Garett reads this. Sorry honey it's a surprise!

So a little blast from the past, this was me last Valentine's Day! I was 5 months pregnant. Crazy, it seems so long ago. Ahhhh I am a mommy! That is crazy. It has been such a fun journey. I am learning so much!

I am out out of thoughts right now....I just put the little man in bed and I'm thinking I need a nap too. It is seriously taking all of the focus I can muster to wrap this up. Hopefully I can get some motivation to do something productive today. Fingers crossed.

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{ander's attic}

So I have decided to jump on the crafty band wagon and start an Etsy store. I thought why not give it a shot? If I don't make much, or anything, I'm only out the $0.20 it cost me to list an item and anything I make that doesn't sell will just make my own home beautiful. It's pretty much a no-risk business venture : )  My goal this week is to list a new item everyday; so far so good. If you want to take a look at my store, Ander's Attic, click here. Below are some items I sell : )

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{christmas}

I'm still trying to catch up on my blogging. I think this is the last catch up post! Yay. For Christmas we went down to St. George to my parents' house. It was a lot of fun. Christmas Eve Anders opened up a present from Mom and Dad. He really did open it! Apparently the wrapping paper is way cooler than the present to babies....

Garett was capturing all the precious moments ; )

We got him The Night Before Christmas and read it to him that night. I kind of want it to be a tradition along with the actual Christmas story. Christmas Eve we also took some Christmas pics of Anders and the tree. That was fun until we put on the Santa suit....he did not like that very much haha.

  

I was so excited for this Christmas, obviously because it's Anders' first Christmas! And boy was that little monster spoiled! Both grandparents were way too good to him! He really enjoyed opening all his presents. Ahhh he was just so stinkin' cute! My mom found Anders' stocking at Down East for $2.50! Score! I made Garett's stocking because his was at his parents' house. I found the BYU fabric in the remnant pile at JoAnn's for like $5. I made one for me and a little one for Anders for decoration. Love them! Here is the pattern I used.

Johnson Family Loot!

Opening up presents from Mom and Dad...I mean from Santa....

My baby is adorable!

Moose Man!

Garett got a new Livestrong phone case. Even with the Lance Armstrong scandal his charity has still done amazing things in the cancer field so we still wear our Livestrong bracelets with pride. Garett had cancer. When he was in the MTC (Missionary Training Center) he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma. One of his companions gave him a Livestrong bracelet and told him to find something to live strong for. Garett said it stuck with him ever since and now we both wear the bracelet.

My mom made Andersen a blanket out of my late grandpa's flannel shirts. It was so awesome! Now Anders has a little bit of his great-grandpa to hold on to. It is such an amazing idea. Hmmmm.....I will have to do something similar to this....stayed posted : )

Anders LOVES his blanket!

We love this game! It's called Dominion and it rocks!

It was a great Christmas. Andersen was so fun. I am so thankful for our little family. I love my boys and I love being a mom and wife.

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{thanksgiving}

Custom-made bottle holder! Ha

This Thanksgiving we drove up to Spokane to be with Garett's family. It's a grueling 12 hour drive anyway but add a baby and it's ridiculous. Thankfully the way up Anders did extremely well. But the ride home was another story....

It was good to be back in Spokane; I'll always consider it my hometown. We had a big Thanksgiving dinner with Garett's extended family up on the farm. Everything was delicious! I was super excited this year because last year I was in my first trimester of pregnancy and was really nauseous Thanksgiving Day so I ate a salad and a roll. Lame. But this year I went all out and no calorie was left behind. It was glorious.

All of Garett's siblings were there as well which as so fun. Andersen got to meet all his little cousins. We wanted to get a picture of all of the grandkids...you can image how that went with four children under the age of three. You can see some of the attempts below. We literally had three cameras going and took at least a hundred pictures but none of them worked. We had to photoshop one so everyone was happy and looking in one direction!

Playing with the cousins!

Anders was fascinated with Teagan's head the whole time!

Close-up of Anders! Whoa!

One of the many takes...

Anders 5 mos; Jayden 2 1/2 years; Teagan 1 mo; Mason 18 mos

Jayden was DONE!

This is the photoshopped one! Not too bad!

And of course we had to do a little Black Friday shopping! While I was out shopping Garett sent me this! He thinks he's so funny trying to sell my baby for so cheap! Anders is worth at least $100 : )

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