Early Valentines

Since Valentines lands on Sunday this year we celebrated early. Not the traditional romantic date, but that really isn't our style. We went to Salt Lake to see only the best bands in concert. Fun. and Jacks Mannequin. I loved it! Fun. puts on such a good show, Jacks Mannequin did a good job too. I can't wait until Fun. comes back to concert again, I will be there. Thanks to our wonderful babysitter Sami who made this date night happen. We love our little Annie but it is so nice to get time without her.

We are excited to announce

that we will be going here in May. Yes we just booked tickets to visit my family in the Dominican Republic. Thank you to my parents for the early birthday present. I am so excited to take Annie to the beach. She loves the water. We take her swimming at the Sports Academy and she is so cute playing in the water. So until then I will be dreaming of the warm pretty beaches.

Holidays and Fun

I haven't posted in awhile but we have been too busy having fun with family and parties. We had a great Holiday season. To kick it off we had what we call a youthful Thanksgiving. We went to West Jordan and spent it with Derrick, Lucy, May and Sami. I think Derrick's Turkey is the best I have ever had and my stuffing was excellent too. Annie and May had so much fun playing together. Lucy and I love to think about the friendship and fun those two will have in the future.


Annie's really cute Christmas dress Grammy gave her.


Before Sami went to visit the fam in the DR she had Annie open her Christmas present early. She gave her this super cute pink and white hat which Annie wears everywhere and everyone comments on how cute she is. Thanks to Aunt Sami for helping Annie be an in style baby!


Kade's mom treated us to a dinner at The Roof, where we all ate way too much, I was stuffed for an entire day after. We also were able to see the lights at temple square.

Having fun playing in all the snow we got in Logan.

Christmas with Grandma and Grandpa Applegate. They gave her these really fun foam blocks, we play with them a lot.

Christmas eve dinner was yummy. We had fun staying in Logan and doing it ourselves.


Christmas morning with our gifts. Annie was so cute with her presents. She loved the baby doll and walker/rider we gave her.

Why Giving Matters

A few weeks ago we had Stake Conference. For the adult session on Saturday our Stake President showed a video of a talk by Arthur C. Brooks given at BYU earlier this year. I loved it and wanted to share it because I thought it was so good. Arthur Brooks is a social scientist specifically an economist studying about charity. He wanted to link money and giving together. He thought that once we had money we would give it away but rather found the opposite. Those who are charitable have more money. Not only that but he links charity to happiness and finds those most happy give the most. Surprisingly to me was that he is not a member of the church. Throughout his whole talk I thought he was. This talk is seriously amazing, it is well worth your time to listen to it. I hope you do:)
You can go to this website and watch or download his speech by clicking
here.

New Game

I swear everyday Annie learns something new. I showed her how to spin the rattle and she picked it right up and started doing it herself. She can also sit up without any support now.

Little Aggie

Halloween

We had a great Halloween this year. I went down to visit Derrick and Lucy Friday and Saturday. May and Annie are so fun, they are such entertainment. Saturday night we had a fun halloween party with friends. We decorated sugar cookies, played the candy bar game, and watched the movie Young Frankenstien. Thanks to all our friends who made the party great, even the Laytons who showed up two hours late but Justins costume was worth it. The best part was dressing up Annie, she is the cutest little lion.

Teeth

My little girl has teeth, what? Yep it was not a fun process but she has her two bottom front teeth. Her smile looks so cute with them.

Pumpkin Walk

Saturday we went to the pumpking walk which was totally cool. I have never gone before and it was different than I thought but we both loved it. We got to see the cool scene set ups, fun pumpkins and they gave us a treat at the end. I recommend going to anyone plus it is free so perfect date night!

Sociology of Family

As a sociology major I studied many theories about society. My favorite is called structural functionalism derived by Emile Durkheim. He compares society to a machine, suggesting that each part of society has to work together to function correctly just like a machine needs all its part in working conditon to do that which it is intended to.
The family is important to society, it is intended to perform certain functions for society. The familys basic functions are to be companionship for adults and to reproduce. It can get more complicated than that as everyone has their own definitions of what a family should look like and do in society.
My idea of family is influenced by my religion. The Lds church has a very strong stand on family. Growing up I was taught that families can be together forever. I was sealed to my husband for time and eternity and it is such a comfort to me to know that I can be with my husband no matter what happens to us. I believe the family is there to teach children. The home is a supplement to school teachers, religious leaders and other parts of society. We should continue the learning process at home.
I believe when the family doesn't take the time to properly teach childern and perform their functions it becomes out of whack that in return will effect other functions of society. I strongly beilieve in the family as one of the most important parts of society. I have given up so many things that I want to do with my life so I can be home with my little girl to raise and teach her how I want. I love the churchs teachings and emphasis on family I feel very strongly about its importance. If you want to know more there is always lds.org that can answer questions.

Sharing the Gospel

I was reading an article in the ensign this month about how successful sharing the gospel online can be. Especially on blogs because a lot of people can access and read public blogs and I have found it is really easy to find blogs through the links on the side. The article talked about how some people who are looking for answers turn to the internet. I always do that for various topics but I never thought anyone would do that for religion. Well I am going to try ocassionally posting some of my beliefs and testimony about the church. I hope that anyone searching for answers will be able to find my blog and my posts will help them. To all my faithful blog friends and readers I hope you will enjoy reading more about me and what I think. If you have anyone that might enjoy reading these posts introduce them to my blog.

Weekend fun

We had an excellent weekend. Kade's mom came up to spend time with us. We had fun making watches, watching movies and playing with Annie. With her here Kade and I were able to go on a date. We enjoyed dinner at Iron Gate Grill and went to see Couples Retreat which was hilarious. Today we carved pumpkins, so much fun!

Loving Fall

I just love all the colors of fall. Friday we went for a drive in the canyon to see the beauty. I am sad to say goodbye to summer but am excited for the fun of fall. To kick it off we enjoyed conference weekend. We were able to spend a lot of time with Sami; watching conference, eating yummy treats and watching movies. Sunday we had the chance to hang out with our friends the Laytons. They cooked us a yummy meal and let us crash at their place to watch conference. What a great time!

Daddy's little girl

I come into the room last night and this is what I find...

Funny

Kade got annie to laugh really good the other night but by the time I got my camera out she was pretty much done. I did catch little giggling. Here is a fun video of her, we think it is so cute!

Snowbird / Park City

This past weekend was Kade's moms 50th birthday. To celebrate we surprised her with a getaway to a Snowbird lodge one night and Park City lodge the next. We had so much fun hiking around, riding the alpine slide, playing at the park, going to Ocotber fest, swimming, playing games and watching movies. We had a big 50's party for her with awesome decorations, music and great food. We had so much fun spending a whole weekend with everyone and annie was great, well except that she thinks she needs to always be with mom and dad now, that little stinker. Here are some fun pictures of our great weekend.

Four Months

Annie is smiling and laughing so much now, she is not a newborn any more. We can't believe how big she has gotten already. She is so much fun!