2015 In Review!

As the new year approaches, I've been looking back over what a crazy and busy year 2015 has been. It's had it's fair share of low points for sure, but it's also had some amazing high points and that's that stuff that I will choose to continue remembering and thriving for continuance in the upcoming year.

Here's a little recap of all the great things we were up to throughout the year.

Trips: We enjoyed a family trip to the Arches and Canyonlands, Mike and I enjoyed a short trip to St. George, and a weekend trip to Vegas. We celebrated our 15th anniversary with a trip to Lake Tahoe, San Francisco and Big Sur, celebrated the 4th of July with another family trip to Bear Lake with my extended family.   We also did our annual camping trip for my family reunion and attended Mike's Corporate Board Retreat in Santa Fe.

Activities: We had 2 successful seasons of soccer, another season of football, several art classes and started dance classes and have attended 2 very successful dance recitals.  Along with enjoying many local trips to the aquarium, the zoo, a Bees game, Wheeler Farm, Swiss Days, a hot air balloon festival and several Paint Nites for us grown ups.  Mike also made his chalk art debut at the Chalk Art festival and had a very successful first round. We celebrated all of the holidays as a family and were able to make it to a ton of Halloween and Christmas activities throughout the valley and successfully pulled off the Ghostbuster themed costumes.

Concerts: 2015 was full of concerts for us. We got to enjoy concerts from NKOTB, Imagine Dragons, Kelly Clarkson, Shania Twain, Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks and the Trans Siberian Orchestra.

Kids: The kids celebrated the finishing of 1st and 5th grades and the starts of 2nd and 6th grades and the grand entrance into preschool. Along with partying hard while turning 12, 7 and 4.

Us: As stated before, Mike and I celebrated 15 years of marriage and also turned another year older. We've been keeping ourselves busy with all of the above and every other little thing that has popped up along the way. We are truly thankful for all of our family and friends that have stayed along for the ride and for the new friends that we've made throughout the year.

May 2016 bring nothing but new adventures, more family time and be full of as many memories as 2015 has been.

Cheers!

Impromptu Game Night

When we had some out of town visitors coming in for a night and another visit from my niece coincided, we also grabbed a couple of local friends and threw together a little pizza and game night on the fly within a few hours.  We had a great time visiting and playing games while the kids had fun with their visitors playing Xbox and other games in the other room after Aunt Becca spoiled them a little, of course.

 We laughed so hard and had such a great time.  We really should be more spontaneous like this more often.

Christmas Day- Part 2

After the opening excitement was over, I made the kids all pose with their hauls. They were more than willing to comply.

Then  gathered up mine and Mike's new goodies for a pic.

 And made Mike pose with this beauty that he bought himself for Christmas on a mega Black-Friday sale.

Then it was time to play, play, play the day away.  Ok, they played. Mom and Dad mostly helped open things, build things, and clean up the messes all day.

 Mom and Dad also opted to surprise the kids with a gift for the family this year and opted for this fun karaoke machine. They've been having a ball busting out a tune or two.

And then we finished out the day with a nice Christmas ham dinner together.

 Cheers to another successful Christmas in the Ouren Household.

Christmas Day- Part 1

We were up and at it early in the morning on Christmas day. We ran downstairs to see what Santa brought us.

 And spent some time showing it all to Mom and Dad.

Then we took turns going through our stockings

And then we passed out presents from under the tree and had some fun watching each other open  them.

From Mom and Dad they each received a calendar, some clothes, slippers. a new tablet, and tickets for an activity, and one other misc gift. Then from grandparents there were new books and some BB guns, a dolly and a new Wii game.

 Pretty good start to our day.