Christmas time

I'm kind of bummed...because there is something going on with my phone. Remember how I had to reformat my SD card? Maybe it's messed up because it just randomly makes pictures so you can't view them on my phone. It's just a blank black screen. What the heck? I saw the pictures in there, but then when you go back they're just black. This doesn't make any sense. I'm going to try and upload them onto my computer manually and maybe they'll show up then. Lets hope, because all of the pictures I took on Christmas at my in law's house are now a blank screen. Boo on that.

So here's a Christmas post with the pictures that will work. Hal and I had such a lovely Christmas. We were fortunate enough to have two Christmas Eve dinners, one with both families. I think Hal was a little more excited about the crab legs than the ham, but both dinners were delicious! I love being gathered around one house just enjoying the company of family. In my family we have a tradition of getting new Christmas pjs every year, this year after we did Secret Santa my sister surprised all of us sisters with matching pjs, unfortunately all of the pictures either didn't turn out or went black, so hopefully I can find some soon and post them.

Christmas morning we opened presents with the in-laws. His parents were so thoughtful in their gift giving to each other. I'm really glad that they liked the picture calendar that I made for them. The best part is that they tricked Hal and got him really simple gifts like a bag of nuts or a cheap dvd and then inside all of them, hidden were lift tickets. His mom told me where the last one was, so when we got to my family's house and started grabbing presents from the car I asked for one of his fruit snacks. He thought I was crazy for wanting one right now. He opened them and handed me one...I looked at him confused, took the box and dumped them out, realizing the box was empty, I asked for one of his other fruit snacks that he got. At this point he thought I was real crazy. He opened it, held out one, but I took the box, looked in to make sure it was in there, and then held open the box for him to see. Haha, I loved his reaction to everything, and how he thought I was being super crazy about it all.

Holy gift giving at my family. Everyone was so generous this year, and so thoughtful. We all had so many gifts to open, and such a good time seeing what everyone picked out for each other.

This is my nephew K. I just had to get a picture of him with his face, shirt, and hands covered in M&Ms that he ate out of his stocking.

Their family is so stinking cute. My sister gave them these cute little frames that talk about being a child of God. So cute.

After going to the movies and hanging out with family, we went home to get the wii, so we could play Just Dance 1 and 2, which people gave us for Christmas, and we decided to take some time and open our gifts to each other.

Hal got some sweet slacks and an electric toothbrush, both of which he really wanted and had no idea I had gotten him. I love surprising people with their gifts, especially when it's something that I knew they really wanted. That is what I love about gift giving. Surprising someone, letting them know that you love them, and care about them, with something that is thoughtful, or they really wanted. That is what I tried to do this year with the gifts I bought, and it made Christmas really special.

Hal was so sweet and gave me the series of Arrested Development which I am so excited to watch and he gave me the dress that I had blogged about wanting here. I had to iron it for Sunday since he bought it months ago! The dress is so adorable, and I'm so excited that Hal gave it to me.

Oh, and last but not least. Christmas night we went on a walk to 7-11 to get some rootbeer for rootbeer floats, and I wore these new bad boys.

Aren't they fantastic! I think so. They are the most comfortable new shoes that I have ever worn, and especially for being really stiff dress oxfords. Actually, I wore them to work today and they haven't had to be broken in at all. Love it.

I've enjoyed reading about all of your Christmases. The holidays are such a magical time.

1940s up-do

Alright guys, I'm about to unveil hours and hours of work...on my hair. It seriously took a really long time. It took at least 2 hours to put pin curls in my hair, 9 hours to let it dry, during which I slept with a scarf over my hair, and then probably another 1 1/2 hours to actually style my hair. I was trying to go off of the video I posted here. It was hard because my hair is not only long, but thick.

I'm pretty bummed because on Friday night my SD card in my phone somehow got damaged and I had to reformat it, which meant I lost all of my personalized settings, and ALL of my photos. Luckily I have a lot of them, here on my blog, or on my email, but it's still such a bummer because there were some that I hadn't uploaded yet, like the pictures of my pincurls when we finished at midnight. If you don't know, this is what they look like...except I had so much hair that my pin curls had to be layered.

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Apparently pin curls is how they started most of their hairstyles in the 1940s. That's how they got those soft waves in their hair, and that's how they did their up-dos. What's nice about pin curls is that your hair will do almost whatever you want after you've done pin curls. You have to brush it out like crazy though if you don't want little curls all over. Ok, so here starts the picture palooza of the process of doing my hair. This is it right after we took out all of the curls.

 

It's just a little bit curly...My hair is so much longer than that, it's crazy how much shorter it gets after setting in curls all night. Then you're supposed to run your fingers through it.

Did someone say big? I thought it look like a judge's white wig from back in the 1800s or something. Especially because the top layers were so curly and the top was more flat. 

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Similar, no?

Oh man, I was a bit worried at this point, but after a lot of brushing, and a lot of magic on the part of my mother-in-law and a lot of hairspray it ended up like this.

I'd say it turned out pretty similar to the hair in the video, but a little longer since I have a lot more hair. A lot of people asked if I cut my hair. Nope, it's all there, it's just tucked away underneath. It probably would have lasted longer if I had made it a bit shorter because it kept rubbing against my coat, or anything really and then stray hairs would come out from underneath. When I took out my hair at the end of the night I had 33 bobby pins in it. I wish we hadn't used so much hairspray either. My hair usually does pretty good with whatever you want it to, so I bet it would have done better if we had finished it all and then hair sprayed it, instead of hair spraying it to try and get the hairs to stay underneath. Good to know for next time, because we have a lot of gel and a lot of pin curl clips that we need to put to use!

Some of you may have seen this picture on twitter. I tweeted it right before we left the apartment for the church. I'm so glad I wore these tights, I thought they pulled everything together well, and they're so comfortable, especially on a cold December day.

 

 This is another bridesmaid and I, all ready and waiting for the bride to finish getting ready. We wore the same dress, and the other 2 bridesmaids wore a similar cut dress, but in burgundy, but the cardigans and the belts pulled everything together so well. The wedding was so fantastic, and I'm really sad these are all of the pictures that I got. That's what happens though when you're in the wedding party and all of your stuff is locked in a room in the basement of the church. I'll definitely have to post pictures once I see the photographer post them, because you'll want to see her vintage inspired dress that she had made! I was so honored to be a part of their wedding, it was such a special ceremony.

Just in case this is my last post for the week, I hope that you all have a wonderful Christmas, filled with family, and the true meaning of Christmas!

My Christmas list

I've been meaning to do this post forever...but well, it's Christmas time and life is busy, so here we are only 5 days away from Christmas and I am just barely getting around to telling out about what I want for Christmas. I've been pretty lucky so far for Christmas since I already know two of the gifts that people have gotten for me. So I'll start with what I wanted that I already knew people have gotten me. 

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I'm so excited about this. Amazon.com was having the complete series of arrested development on sale for $28 and free shipping! Check out that deal! Hal tried to not get it for me saying that we can watch it on netflix, but then I said maybe we wouldn't always have netflix and I need this in my life...so he bought it for me. And was so nice one night when I said I just wanted to fall asleep to it, not knowing if he really got it for me, he gave me the first season to watch, and I have fallen asleep to it many nights in the last week.

Second and best of all that I am pretty sure my mother in law got for me, these bad boys:

 

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Can I tell you a little story about these shoes? I fell in love with them a long time ago. But they are expensive, so I didn't buy them. Well, for Christmas people asked me what I wanted, so I started hunting for them again, and much to me sadness I couldn't find them anywhere. BOO! It says you should buy a half size up, so that made it even harder to find! I thought I had found them once, and my mother-in-law went to buy them, and it said unavailable. Double BOO. Well today I was going to go looking for another pair of oxfords, even though I didn't want to settle. So I decided to check 6pm.com again, since that is who tricked me with their unavailability the first time. And guess freaking what! They had them, in my size, and it said only one left in this combination. You bet you I called my mother-in-law so fast. That's why I'm fairly sure that she got them for me...since she was talking to me when she bought them and said she hoped they get here in time. I totally don't care if they make it by Christmas, I'm just glad that I found them. Thank you to the best mother-in-law in the world!

Alright, now onto things I don't know if someone got me, but they're still awesomely awesome.

First, is this pillow case set from Urban Outfitters. They have some pretty cool ones on there, but this one takes the cake.

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Isn't that something pretty much fantastic? Oh man, when i saw this I just knew that at some point I was meant to own these suckers. They have such fantastic apartment things at Urban. Love it. And I love that Hal would totally let me put these on our bed.

Both Hal and I really want this:

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Actually, I would take Just Dance 1 or 2. We played Just Dance 1 at a friend's house. It was SO much fun. Seriously, it's a work out and a party all at once. It's even better than the wii fit for a work out I think, because you don't even really realize that you're getting a work out until you've done a crazy song and you're catching your breath. It's really fun, and I hope Santa brought us this.

I hope that you all have been enjoying your Holiday Season. I'm pretty much done Christmas shopping, except I have one more gift to get since I decided to change one at the last minute. Now it's time to wrap them tonight before people come into town tomorrow. 

Oh, and P.S. my hair turned out great for the wedding, just wait for that post!

1940s Hairstyle help

I need some advice. My closest friend is getting married this weekend and we've decided to go for a vintage look. I've done the vintage look before. I did it at my wedding, my amazing brother in law did my makeup and his friend did my hair. I went to link it to picture from my wedding and then I realized that I haven't ever posted many pictures from my wedding, so here is one of my hair by the end of the night, so it was a bit messy, but it was hard to see it when I had my veil in earlier in the day.

 

Don't you love the intensity of the guy talking to us? This is Hal's Dad's best friend, and Hal's middle name came from him. Oh yeah, pardon my tangent.

I have 1940s style on my hair quite a few times for different events. I did it for the vintage photo shoot, if you need a refresher. I also did it for Halloween this year because I was a 40's girl. So anyway, I wanted to try a new way of doing it for the wedding. Maybe make it a little bit more true to the 1940s. I started searching on youtube to find videos, there were a lot of really good ones.

I found this one:

But my problem is...I have long hair. The girl in the video's hair looks so cute, but my hair is like twice as long as that. I have long, curly/wavy really thick hair....Does anyone have any suggestions or seen any videos on how to turn long hair into a really cute 1940s hairstyle? My hair pretty much does what I tell it to do, so if you have a suggestion, it might work on my hair. I was thinking of trying to do an altered version of this hairdo and somehow change the long part, like maybe pin it to look shorter? So please, if you've done 1940s hairstyles, or if you have come across a video, please let me know...because I am going to do pin curls in my hair tomorrow night and sleep on them so they'll be dry Saturday morning. So please, give me your suggestions, and quick!

Temple Square Lights

Things have quieted down a little bit around our house. Well, quiet because it's the end of the semester and all Hal has been doing is studying, and one of my closest friends is getting married this weekend and I'm her maid of honor..actually, I think it's now matron of honor so I've been helping her get ready for her big day. I am actually pretty bummed, my phone currently is being evil and won't show the pictures for the bachelorette party....so that post will have to wait until i get that figured out.

I think I'm officially done with all of my Christmas shopping. I always have fun trying to find a deal on whatever my family wants. I really enjoy that for some strange reason. But if you're looking for something and are having a hard time...let me know, I'll search for it. Haha, maybe I'm addicted or something.

Hal and I went to Temple Square with his family to see the lights when they were here around Thanksgiving. Seeing the lights are a big tradition here in Utah. If you don't know about the Temple Square lights are, you're missing out. Every year they put, probably millions of lights around all of Temple Square and light them I think on Thanksgiving night. It's SO pretty, but it's also SO cold. And oh man, it was sure cold the night we went. I didn't get any shots of the family that came with us, so boo on that.

Hal really likes not looking at the camera or making the silliest face he can think of. After this picture I told him he needed to smile because he is always making faces like this in our pictures, so we never have pictures to put on important things, because they end up looking like this. Then I felt bad because He's Hal, and he's silly and I would be sad if he wasn't as silly as he is. But he gave me this picture even though I was mean.

Man, it was SO cold while we were there. It had snowed recently and the temperature dropped like mad after that storm came in, it was a bad time to go! We didn't end up staying long, but I did get this picture of the lights.

And I also managed to get this sweet video of Hal and He-Sam dancing to try and keep themselves warm. Oh man, when these two get together the ridiculousness never ends. Sorry it's sideways, I still haven't quite figured out the video camera on my phone...or how to turn videos. If you know, please let me know how to turn videos!

Snooki look alike?

I really love it when family comes into town. They're family, they're fun, and we all love each other, so what's not to love about them coming into town and spending time with them? Hal's entire family came in for Thanksgiving and we had so many good times with them while they were here.

One of the most memorable moments definitely was when someone mentioned that Hal's mom's doppelganger should be Snooki...

Oh, have I ever mentioned that my brother in law is a makeup artist for Mac?

He went to town and this was born.

This was the beginning stages of the makeover. Man, bronzer can make someone look tan instantly when you putt it all over their face! And here's the finished product.

What do you think? Snooki in 20 years?

I think it's not too far off! This made my night, I just thought it was so funny...Then that same brother, who...how do I put this nicely? Is becoming hair challenged? Has a bit of a receding hair line? Anyway, I looked over and saw this.

Doesn't it look kind of real? I totally thought that it did. It kind of blew my mind actually. What a great way to spending Thanksgiving evening with family!I really hope that this video uploads, apparently we were just a silly bunch that night. I guess that's what happens when you pull out a box full of makeup and hair cutting/styling supplies. The possibilities are endless.

Thanksgiving pies

Before I get into the Christmas posts I figure I should do some my Thanksgiving post. We had such a fun Thanksgiving, Hal's whole time family came into town, so it was wonderful to spend time with everyone, especially since none of them are coming back for Christmas. We tried a new tradition this year. Apparently Hal's aunt's family has done this for years so we decided to try it. Since in a lot of families the women do the work for the Thanksgiving dinner they make the guys take care of dessert. Each guy has to make a pie and then everyone rates them and a winner is picked.

I was SO impressed with all of the pies. Hal's family knows how to cook, and from scratch! Here is a picture of all of the pies.

We were all so stuffed even from such a little taste of each of them. Lets see, we had a pumpkin pie, a pumpkin cheesecake, a key lime pie, a chocolate satin pie...I think that's what it was, a chocolate bourbon pecan pie, and a creme brulee pie.

Here are all of the boys with their pies. They worked so hard on them, and they were all really really good! Hal made the Key Lime pie. He actually made my pumpkin pie from scratch (even a real sugar pumpkin) a few days before, but then he found out his dad was doing pumpkin and so at like midnight the night before Thanksgiving he went to the store to get stuff for a key lime pie. I found him a recipe that didn't use key limes, since he couldn't find any, but then being the mathematical mind he is...he read that they were 2-3 times stronger than regular ones, so he calculated how much extra juice he needed....Bad idea...It was good, it just didn't set up all of the way and was well...very potent, so it was just right in the little taste testing bits we had.

The winner was....

Dane, the baby of the family! His was definitely my favorite. He made a creme brulee into a pie. Essentially a huge delicious creme brulee. I couldn't stop eating it. The next day I just sat there and just ate it for like 20 minutes. He added pretzels to his crust. I normally don't like graham cracker crust, but the pretzels made it so good.

Most holiday traditions have to do with Christmas, so it was nice to have a new one for Thanksgiving. I can't wait to see what everyone does next year. How could they even step it up?

Christmas Cards

I'm just going to do this post rather straight forward...Like not try and pretend that I'm not doing this to get something awesome free out of it. I wouldn't do it though if I didn't think it was worth it, or I didn't think it was a cool offer.

Do you remember a few posts ago where I gave some ideas for doing things for Christmas. Remember how I mentioned a company called Shutterfly? They have some really cool products and I've used them for two Christmases now for presents. I've ordered both a book and a calendar from them. The book turned out really good, the quality was pretty impressive, but I'm still waiting on the calendar, and hope that it will turn out with the same quality.

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Well Shutterfly is offering something pretty cool this year. To anyone who has a blog you can send in your blog address and once they review your blog they will send you an e-mail with instructions on what to do to get 50 free holiday cards. So here is this post, following the instructions on what to do. This is actually a pretty cool promotion.  They actually have quite a selection to choose from when it comes to holiday cards. You can get a stationary kind, and a photo card kind. Both have so many different layouts and designs to choose from. I haven't done their cards yet, but with the books and calendars you did so much of the designing yourself, which I thought was pretty cool.

If you want to participate in this promotion too, feel free, and spread the word about Shutterfly and their awesome products, but you better do it soon if you want to send them out this year!