Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas All -

What a great day it has been, early this morning we made our way up to Steve's brother's house for Christmas morning. We spent the morning watching the boys get their presents from Santa and then exchanging gifts with Steve's family, afterwards Kim made a wonderful breakfast and we headed down to see my family. After spending a few hours with my parents and Mark, we came back home to open our gifts.

As usual Steve spoiled me even though technically our gift to one another was our new Bosch Dishwasher which is awesome - I know it sounds boring, but I love it, and we needed something new.

Finally after our own little celebration we moved on to the large (at least in numbers) celebration at my Grandma Johnson's. There were about 30 of us, treated to great food, a silly white elephant game, and then the famous bingo game - we Johnson's Love our Games. There always seems to be one or two silly gifts that everyone wants, this year those gifts included a can of baked beans, and bottles of rootbeer - both from the dollar store.

But the best part of Christmas today and every year is the time I get to spend with family!

Below are a few pictures that I couldn't resist sharing

My Dad at our house on Christmas Eve - isn't his hat great!

Merry Christmas Steve -

Me and my Brother!

Wherever you celebrated your holiday today - we hope that you had a Very Merry Christmas.

'twas the night before Christmas

Jill and I want to wish everyone a safe and Merry Christmas Eve!

Later this afternoon, we're having both sets of parents over for a Christmas Eve dinner. Jill's making clam chowder, baking a ham, and making green bean casserole. The green bean casserole was made at my request...Jill says it looks disgusting :( She must love me! To finish things off, I made a New York Cheesecake from scratch. I've been promising Jill I would make one since I first met her, so I guess it's time I followed through.

Accoring to KSL.com, we are expecting heavy snowfall starting 11 p.m. tonight, which will give us a fresh blanket of snow in the valley...giving us a White Christmas! I feel so bad for people who live in areas where they seldom if ever get snow on Christmas. (ha ha....that comment is for you Tyson!)

Our Sealing

So, I know it is about a week late, but I wanted to post a photo from last Saturday, December 13th - the day that Steve and I were sealed for Time and Eternity.

It was an incredible day, it even included a large snowfall, one of my favorite things. We were so lucky to be joined by our friends and family who lived nearby. Thank you all for your love and support.

Most of all though I would like to thank Steve, for being the best husband I could have asked for and for wanting to be sealed to me for eternity.

Baking with Mom

So today I spent the day with my Mom. That isn't something I get to do very often any more, but at about 10:00 AM she called to say that she was going to be making cookies, and she wanted to see if I would like to come help. It took a minute but soon the benefits of working together became clear 1) I would get to spend some quality time with my mom 2) we can split what we make so the extra doesn't go to waste 3) the mess wouldn't be at my house!

Anyway it was a great day we baked

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Green Mint Brownies

Chocolate Crackles

Molasses Cookies

The molasses cookies aren't usually a part of the Christmas Baking in our family but they came at special request from Steve and turned out to be pretty good. There is still plenty more to bake/make before the Holiday - like Steve's famous cheesecake he has promised to make us all on Christmas Eve. But, it was a great way to spend the day with my mom.

PS

Steve and Dad were here as well, Steve brought his computer and played games while we baked, and Dad helped out as well - all we were missing was Mark - we missed you Mark!

Let it snow!

I just finished speaking with my nephew, Perry, who informed me that it's "only 6 days until Christmas". This truly is a magical time of year. It has a way of bringing out the 6 year old in all of us.

Wow, how fast this year has gone by. Today, it's been snowing like crazy outside, which definitely helps make it feel more like the Christmas season, and yet isn't any fun to try and commute through so Jill and I have decided to try and avoid the roads as much as possible today, stay home, hole-up, and watch a few Christmas movies.

Tomorrow night, we've got our first holiday party of the season, at the

Dorius house. That should be a lot of fun. Their house is usually lit up like the Griswold house from "Christmas Vacation" (which is totally AWESOME!!!). I don't know how her Aunt Vicki does it. I get a bit nervous just trying to hang a single string of lights across the front of the roof top. This year, Jill and I just decided to hire her brother Mark to come over put up our lights. After the party, I'm going to do my best impression of Speed Racer and try to get home in time to catch most of the Las Vegas Bowl so that I can cheer for the Lord's team, BYU, who will be playing against Arizona. While this year started out so good for the Cougars, it ended with a bit of let down against the dreaded Utes (sorry Jill!). So, it'd be great to see them rebound and win their bowl game. I will be cheering for the Utes when they play against Alabama next week. Anybody that wants to come watch the game, give us a call!

Steve & Jill's big day at "The Big T"

So, one night about eighteen months ago, while Jill was out of town on business I decided to call up our bishop and talk to him about my desire to be able to spend, not only the rest of my life with Jill, but the rest of eternity as well. Well, one thing lead to another, and the next thing you know we're making plans to get sealed together for all time and eternity in the LDS Temple in Bountiful, UT. We had our ordinances done today, December 12th, and will be getting sealed tomorrow December 13th.

I can't believe how quick the past couple of years has gone by. It seems like only yesterday that Jill and I were getting married. I guess it's true what they say, time really does fly when you're having fun.

A Few Comments About China - From Jill's Point of View

1) China was amazing - I am so glad that we went, but I am also very glad to be home.

2) The Great Wall was amazing - although I got a little nervous when were climbing back down the stairs



3) The Leaning Pagoda was one of my favorite sites



4) The public restrooms were my least favorite site



5) The buffet dinners/lunches were my second least favorite site



6) People loved having their picture taken with Steve



7) The Tour Guides were a wealth of knowledge - with interesting points of view, I am sure that the truth lies somewhere in between what we learn here in the US and what they told us in China





8) The Pollution was worse than I could have imagined




9) Pam, Sue and Nick were great tour companions



10) But, the best part was getting to see an amazing / different place with Steve

China

Welcome to Steve and Jill's Blog --- what a November it has been for us, First we celebrated our 2nd Wedding Anniversary, and then we went to China, can you believe that Steve went to China? I was so excited when he decided to the join the trip with me. Here are a few of our pictures below.