This is one of the cutest candid moments yet. It just makes you smile when you look at him. He is always laughing, smiling, and talking so much! He is getting so big and getting a personality of his own for sure! It's definitely more rewarding each day to have him here!
I love Christmas and am really excited for this year. It will be Dawson's first Christmas and we got some cute 'first christmas' pj's. What else do you get a 3 month old baby??
This is our Christmas Tree. J.D.'s family has a tradition that every year, the saturday after Thanksgiving we up in the mountains and get Christmas trees. It is so fun! Then we eat turkey sandwhiches and have hot chocolate afterwards. J.D. found such a good tree this year! We even took Dawson up and he loved it. (He loves being outside) We found out that J.D. has always had a star on there family's tree growing up, and I have always had an angel. .. We decided to do an angel this year. It's interesting the different traditions in each family. Maybe we will do a star next year.
My favorite part of Christmas is waking up really early when it's still way dark outside, Santa has already come, and then sitting there just looking at the tree all lit up with sparkling presents underneath. And then we would get our stockings down and dump them out and just eat candy. It was so quiet and it seemed so magical. Dawson wakes up usually around 5 ready to eat, and J.D. gets home around 5:30am... So we just turn on the lights and sit there. I love christmas!
This past week I started watching my nephew Carson while Jori goes to work. It has been such a good experience for me. I love spending time with him. It's been tricky having 2 boys to take care of, especially since Dawson is still breastfeeding and Carson is only 13 months. I think that this is so good for me and will help prepare me for a 2nd little on of our own.
Each day I try to take the boys for a walk to get fresh air. It's still not too cold to go out and do this. Since Carson can't walk and Dawson is too small to carry on my back I had to improvise.... hahaha! I pushed Dawson in the stroller and packed Carson on my back... Those of you who have seen Carson know that he is a big boy... we are talkin' 97%tile with weight, and heighth. :) It's a workout but its good in every way!
This Sunday J.D. blessed Dawson. It was so beautiful, and sweet. He did such a great job and it was so neat to see J.D. be able to bless him. I'm so blessed to have such an amazing, worthy priesthood holder for eternity. I love knowing that the spirit is right there guiding the words of the blessing. We had so many people that came and supported Dawson. Most had to travel and knowing that meant so much to us. Thank you to all who traveled! I hope everyone made it home safe. After the blessing J.D. and i just sat through the rest of church looking at eachother and Dawson. We had some pretty neat thoughts today.
Afterwards we had a luncheon and it was so much fun. It was so nice to visit and just relax. Everything went so well!
This is our family. Dawson had the most handsome tuxedo on! It had a cummer band, bowtie, and tails on his coat! He was lookin mighty fine!
This is Grandma and Grandpa Stevens with us.
This is Grandma and Grandpa Shelley with us
Here is everybody that stood in the circle. From Left to Right it is Jefferson Coats (J.D.'s highschool buddy), Alan Richardson (Jenny's sister in law's dad.), Chet(J.D. bro), Grandpa Stevens, J.D & Dawson, Andy Alldredge (my best friend growing up) Alan Alldredge, (andy's dad), Lucas(J.D. bro), and choc (my bro). The only person missing that was there was J.D.'s best friend and mission comp Todd Evertsen. 
Dawson sure has a lot of people who love him!
This Thanksgiving we spent it with the Shelley side. It was very interesting, only because I was the one cooking. The only thing I didn't cook was the pies and corn. I was in charge of taking out a pie though which ended up burnt because I left it in too long. Growing up I always saw my mom cooking and slaving away all day for thanksgiving... I must have missed something because it doesn't take that long. The turkey didn't get done in time because we put it in too late, so we had a turkeyless thanksgiving. I did the mashed potatoes too early, so I was having to microwave them until they were warm again. The stuffing and gravy were good except I didn't cook enough. The rolls didn't get done until we were half way through eating... what else could go wrong.. Well, nothing.. I learned whether it's good or bad, on time or not on time, everyone just eats and enjoys it. And in the end all the food does get eating in the next couple of days anyways. I was so worried and worked up over nothing. :) It was my first time cooking it, and it was fun. We all have to learn someway right???
This weekend my grandma was throwing my grandpa a suprise party. We didn't really suprise him .. it was just a party. (He might of died if we would have suprised him...:) Anywho, it was so nice to see so much family. On Saturday night we went to swimming. It was so fun to finally swim and sit in a hot tub... I haven't sat in one since before I got pregnant, so you can imagine the excitement. Then on Sunday we went to the zoo! That was just a blast. It was so much fun to be with the kids there. They make things so much more exciting. On Monday we drove back and we drove the vegas way. We saw Hoover Dam... It was just amazing seeing the construction. It's a much better looking dam than the Lake powell one. We had never seen Hoover Dam until then and it was worth the drive.
At the zoo there was a petting zoo at the end of it. The kids had a blast! My nephew Carson is as tall as the goat! The goat just jumped right up on him.. Carson loved it!
Carson and 2 baby goats. He loves animals and couldn't get enough of these 2.
More kids and more animals. They were in there glory!
I don't know of how many of you have ever fed a giraffe.. there tongues are so freaking long! It was so slobbery too!
It's Pumba from Lion King! I will say he's better looking in the movie... :)
We loved seeing the camels. They really are not very neat eaters... It was very cool to actually see the humps in real life
Zebra's! What if our skin was striped like that???
This was my first time seeing a flamingo... and how lucky to catch some of them sleeping. How can they do that? I tried it and there is no way I could be that still, or better yet sleep like that. They should be ballerinas
Once again a first seeing a rhino! My good friend Brie posted a pic a while back of us doing the rhino dance when we were young... This reminded me of that. There foot is like the hood of a car! They are so massive! The horn was so amazing.
This was probably my favorite. I love monkeys! This was a baby monkey swinging on his tail. It was so adorable. I wish we could of held him.
Here's my a few nieces and nephews. James, Layne, Rylee and Jessi.. behind them is a white tiger! He was pacing the fence... my sister jori got a branch and tried to poke it.. oh wow, he didn't like it at all and tried to eat it!!!!! haha! What a sucker..
This is construction on Hoover Dam. Bridges really amaze me. I can't believe the things that men can build. How they do it is just incredible!
