Happily Ever 2012 and a Magical New Year

With the holidays so much has happened that I haven't yet blogged about. Naturally, there was my favorite holiday in the whole world, Christmas. Which, for some reason, I'm always really bad about documenting.

But, here is a little bit of what Christmas looked like for us:

The above picture is one of the best presents given to my mother in law. The kiddo holding the sign is my nephew and about four or five summers ago him and his family were driving to Bear Lake and he wakes up and sees the lake and says, "Bear Yake?! I Yove Bear Yake!" And we've all been saying it ever since. A little while ago my mother in law said that she wanted to get a plaque that said and thus this was born.

This year I decided to start a new tradition for our little family. I decided each year we'd get an ornament that symbolized something significant that happened for us that year. Jayson got a heart for adoption and I got a fox because I finally got Ruby (I've been wanting a dog for forever!) and everyone says she looks like a little fox.

My sisters in law are the coolest. 

And then a few days after Christmas we headed out to southern California for the first ever (well, the first one I've been to besides Bear Lake trips) big family vacation with Jayson's family.

 This is the only picture I got of the drive out there, but it's a cute one!

 This picture cracks me up.

 We had to get a picture of Joshua next to a Joshua tree at Joshua Tree National Forest.

Grilling in December.

There were also in the Joshua Tree National Forest. They're really cool cacti that are apparently supposed to  jump at you a little if you get to close and their needles have barbs on the end, so they can be hard and painful to get out. But, they're pretty cool to look at.

Pride Rock.

                                     

This was a cool old mill from a mine in the Joshua Tree.

And this is what New Year's Eve looked like for us this year. This is the first New Year's ever I can recall being out of town. Obviously it was wonderful.

Kelly gets the award for the first to fall asleep. I think he was even out before the babies.

And then there was New Year's Day. I just want to tell you that I think Disneyland is the very best way to start out a New Year. 2013 is bound to be a good year! It wasn't even super crowded (partially due to the fact that the Rose Bowl was that day, I'd imagine) and it was still all decked out in Christmas decorations. Christmas and Disneyland are two of my very favorite things, so having both of them together...well, I just about died. It's been a dream of mine for a long time to see Disneyland at Christmastime too. Seriously, as soon as I entered the park I wanted to cry. It was incredible. It honestly was one of the most magical experiences of my life. 

This was after Splash Mountain. Jayson was wearing his jacked on the ride, so it only got the part of the shirt not covered by the jacked wet! We thought it was funny, so we took a picture.

The Haunted Mansion all decked out in Nightmare Before Christmas stuff.

We didn't get to see fireworks because of the wind, which I was really bummed about, but we did get to see them light the castle and they even made it snow some fake snow. I might have almost cried when it started fake snowing because this one little kid got SO excited. He was like, "SNOW!!!" And I imagined in my head that it was a California child who had never seen snow before.

Small World is one of my favorite rides. I know it's super cheesy and it gets on a lot of people's nerves, but I've always loved it. I love that it shows all of the different cultures and then at they end everyone is in white and all together and it feels a little bit like heaven. It's magnificent all decorated for Christmas and it even has the cutest Christmas decorations inside the ride. It was honestly one of my favorite parts of the day!



We also got to spend some time in La Jolla, which is one of my favorite places in the world. It was also probably the warmest day of our trip, so we played in the ocean a little bit. I love the ocean with my whole entire heart and I miss it already. My one and only tiny regret of the trip is that I didn't get to spend more time with the ocean.

I love the photobomb by the other Karissa

Can you tell that they're related?

I taught the above kiddo how to say "ocean". Because that's what good aunts do.

This poor little guy was playing on the shore and not paying attention when a big wave washed on the sand and he go SOAKED.

And while we were in La Jolla I got to fulfill another dream of mine. I finally got to go into the San Diego temple and it was just as beautiful as I ever imagined it would be. It was even decked with Christmas lights!

After that we spend our last day on vacation in California Adventures. I got to ride the Little Mermaid ride! Which, by the way, was super cute. And you guys...Cars Land! You have to go there. It is seriously incredible. Like, really. Disney really out-did themselves. I wish I would have taken more pictures of it, but I was just to aw struck to even think about it. And the new Radiator Springs ride was INCREDIBLE. Seriously, it looked like you stepped right into the movie. Go there. Right now. Get there when the park first opens and head straight over to get a fast pass for it though, otherwise you might wait FOREVER. And just so you know the fast pass is nowhere near the ride. It's all the way over by the Tower of Terror. And the World of Color! I cried. Everyone cried. It's absolutely one of the best things you will ever see.

It was this little baby's first time in a Disney Park, so naturally it had to be documented. I love that it looks like she has a huge double chin.

This girl probably looks bored on the Sea Horse because her favorite ride is Hollywood Tower of Terror. Seriously. She rode it like four times.

This kiddo got pretty tired, but he was a trooper. His being tired also made for some good snuggle time with Uncle Jayson, which Jayson absolutely loved, during the SUPER long Toy Story ride line.

And there you have it. I will probably eventually reflect on 2012 and tell you of my goals for 2013 and all that jazz, but this blog post has gotten unreasonably long already, so we'll save that for another day. Have a magical evening!