Merry Christmas!

We are doing an electronic Christmas letter this year...enjoy!

Merry Christmas!
Jana and I have clung to a new favorite quote by Thomas S. Monson, “The future is as bright as your faith.”
This past year has been one of growth, laughter, challenge, and work … all good things, as long as our ambitions are anchored in the right place.
As expected, our children have occupied center stage in life. Daylen, our 3-year old son, has wowed us with his learning and curiosity and energy levels. He has fully embraced his role as a big brother, showing us many moments of brilliance and kindness towards our youngest, Kate. If only that was the case all the time … but so it goes.
Our 18-month-old, Kate, has completely captivated us with her growing personality. A typical day for her usually includes trailing Daylen, taking 1.5 naps, some random singing, making a mess, and then helping Jana clean it up.
Along with the busyness of raising children, Jana has taken great interest in building and utilizing our 1-year food supply. Also, as time permitted, she was able to enjoy several “must-read” books from an ever-growing list (one of her favorite pastimes).
I have felt more grateful than ever this year for good employment and for the challenge and opportunity to stay busy and stay involved.
In May, Jana and I took a more serious look at the down real estate market and put an offer on a home in Salem, UT (about 20 minutes from my work). After three months of weathering the bureaucracy of today’s lending, we moved into a home we love and will enjoy for years to come. One month later, we happily discovered that Jana is pregnant with our 3rd child, with a due date of May 11th, 2010.
It is humbling to ponder the blessings from our loving Heavenly Father, and especially to ponder His greatest gift, even Jesus Christ. We express our heartfelt love and best wishes to you and your families, and we hope this Christmas season graces you with an increased measure of peace and joy for the new year.
Sincerely,
Brad, Jana, Daylen and Kate Gasaway

Helpful Kate

This is just a cute picture of the kids hugging each other before we headed over to my aunt's house in Springville for a SUPER YUMMY Thanksgiving dinner! I love it when they give each other hugs or walk around the house holding hands.

Remember how in my last post I said how Kate loves to be helpful? Here is one way she helps out. Unloading the silverware from the dishwasher is Daylen's job. As soon I say "Daylen, it's time to do your job." Kate comes running to unload some silverware, Daylen on the other hand...

As you can see she can reach the drawer to throw them in, but she can't put them in the right spot.

All finished with a nicely disorganized silverware drawer. So I guess it would be more accurate to say Daylen's job is putting the silverware in the right spots after Kate has unloaded them from the dishwasher.

Random Acts...

I know it's been awhile...sorry mom. Here are some pictures of the kids. Not much has been happening lately so here are some random acts of life in our home.

Daylen and Kate were running around the living room wrapped in their blankets one night before bed.

Our little cookie monster...she has a sweet tooth like her daddy.

Kate loves to be helpful. Daylen asked me to button his jammies for him so Kate immediately took the task upon herself to help him out.

Daylen came to me one day with his blanket draped over his head like this and said, "Look mom, I'm Mary!"

The other morning Brad went in to get Kate out of bed and found a little ballerina instead. Notice the crazy hair, I finally got Kate some ponytails of her own, she still just has a little tiny one on the top of her head. Some day she'll have hair...**sigh**

Hope you enjoyed a gimpse in to the every day life of our family.

Lately...

Daylen likes to make faces for the camera.

Daylen has been so funny lately. Not always so much the things he says, but how he says them and his facial expressions while saying them. This kid has such an expressive face, I love it! Like this morning when I came into the kitchen and Daylen saw me for the first time and says all excitedly, "Hi mom! How are you this morning?" Or when Brad comes home from work and we sit down to eat dinner and Daylen asks, "So how was your day today?" or "What did you do at work today? Did you eat lunch?" He has been talking nonstop lately, too, he's a little motor mouth.

Coming May 11, 2010

New Project

Brad found this log bed on Craigslist a couple of weeks ago. I went to look at it and it was in pretty good condition, it was the lighter log color and it had a few pen marks and scratches, but other than that it looked nice. So we decided to get it. We got the bed, the mattress and box springs, and the bedding (not what you see here) all for $75! I wanted to get a before picture, but thought about it too late so you just get the after. We went to Home Depot and got a deep mahogany minwax stain which requires little prep work. Brad went to work sanding it down, applied 2 coats of the stain, and this is what we got!

We're really happy with the way it turned out, now we want to stain our dresser and night stand to match it. (And we really need a bed skirt, my mom made our quilt and we have been using it since we've been married.)

Dance Competition

My little sister, Lori, had her first dance competition at BYU! She competed the waltz against all the other 184 students, and did pretty good! They got a couple of call backs. We went to watch and cheer her on, it brought back so many fun memories of my dancing days at BYU. I was in her same shoes as a freshmen, competing the waltz in my very first dance competition and my partner and I won 2nd place! I realized how old I am getting though, I didn't know anyone there, not even the teachers! Just the heads of departments. It was a fun night, way to go Lori!

BYE BYE SUMMER

It's sad for me to think summer is really over.

But when I see this outside my window...

there's no denying the truth.
Winter is coming.

I wish my camera could have captured

the colors better. The mountains are

absolutely BEAUTIFUL right now.

The yellows and reds with the white snow,

these pictures just don't do them justice.

You'll just have to take my word for it

BEAUTIFUL!

HURRAY!!

(I couldn't get him to look at the camera, he wanted to look at himself.)

Guess who is potty trained!!

DAYLEN! Give him a hip hip hurray!

I kept saying I would potty train Daylen after we moved.

Well, we moved so I was out of excuses.

The hardest part was convincing him to wear underwear.

For the first 2 weeks he would pee almost every time

in the toilet,but he refused to poop.

He wanted his diaper for that.

I finally convinced him we were out of diapers

so if he wanted to go play at the park he

had to put underwear on.

That did it.

This was Labor Day, and he's been in

underwear ever since.

He had a couple of poop accidents,

but I blame that on the diarrhea.

He has never wet the bed, never had a wet accident.

It's been 1 week and now he even goes

by himself without even telling me!

He's been awesome.

Yeah for having only 1 in diapers!

Little Miss Kater keeps us laughing.

She loves to eat and has resorted to licking her plate clean.

She also drinks everything out of her bowl because its

just easier than using a fork or spoon!

Come Again?

Actually I think my exact words when the

bishop gave me my new calling were

WHAT? REALLY?

Are you SURE?

Curious yet?

WARD CHIOR DIRECTOR!

Huh?? Me?? Ward Choir Director?

Yes, I love music.

Yes, I have music in my background.

Yes, I have sung in choir.

Yes, I was in band all growing up.

Yes, I play the piano, though not well.

BUT, choir director? REALLY?

Yes apparently.

Never in a million years would I have expected this.

Here goes nothing.

Aloha Run

Yeah! We finally have the internet again! We just got connected last night, I feel like I've been cut off from the world, but I am back. Now that I am back I can post pictures from my very first 5K run! It was the Aloha run in Mapleton a week and a half ago. Namifiers sponsered it, so I actually didn't even think about doing it until the night before. Rachel and I decided to do it together, the only time I can run with her is when she is pregnant, that way I can't slow her down. Brad ran it pushing the kids in the jogging stroller and still killed us. I hadn't run in about a month so I was a little nervous, but we jogged the whole time and felt good! It was just a small race so I never found out what my time was which I am bummed about. We didn't even think about wearing a watch, but we think we did it somewhere between 40-45 minutes. It was a fun experience!

I put Miss Kater's hair in her very first ponytail the other day. 15 months old and barely has enough for somewhat of a decent hairdo. It sticks straight up, but I thought she looked cute!

Home Sweet Home

A few pictures for your viewing pleasure.

We are slowly getting unpacked.

We have accumulated quite a bit of "stuff"

over the past 3 1/2 years.

We really hope the dead grass comes back.

Family Room

Kitchen

Entry Room/Front Room

Master Bath

We love our new home, I am just so anxious to get all boxes out of my sight!

Can it Really be TRUE??

We don't have to eat all our meals on the kitchen floor anymore?

Or live in a house with no toys? (Although soccer is much easier with no furniture!)

Remember how 2 weeks ago I posted how excited we were to have closed on our brand new house? Yeah. Well, 2 weeks later we finally get to move in to that house which has been so generously holding all of our stuff just waiting for us! We have survived an absolutely crazy, nightmare of 2 weeks, living in our house with just our bed (thankfully), computer, and piano. Paper plates, bowls, and cups have been our friends, creative juices have flowed to help us come up with dinners, with the help of friends and family, and lots of getting out of the house activities. We have overcome it all and actually will get to live in it now! (Good thing since my family is coming to bring Lori to school TODAY!) I will post pictures as soon as I can!

P.S. I do not plan on moving again for a VERY LONG TIME IF EVER.

P.P.S. If you plan on moving soon take my advise and use a financial institution, DO NOT USE A MORGTAGE BROKER!

$2 Tuesday!

Thanksgiving Point has $2 Tuesdays for the month of August so we decided to take advantage of the opportunity and go check out the Dinosaur Museum. Unfortunately, half of the Salt Lake Valley had the same great idea. The line wrapped around 3 sides of the building! It's a big building. Luckily the line moved pretty fast, it only took us about 45-50 minutes to make it to the door. We went with our friends Becky, Ben, and Julia so the time in line seemed to go fast. The kids had fun playing with the dinosaurs, puzzles, running up and down the ramps, and digging for bones in the sand. It was impossible to get many pictures of their faces, they were just too busy for pictures, definately worth the $2 for a fun morning. Thanks for going with us Becky, Ben, and Julia!

Weekend Getaway

Ever need to just get away? Forget all your problems and just have fun and spend time with the ones you love? This last weekend was one of those weekends. We decided Thursday night to just take off and have fun! So Friday after Brad got off work we headed to Rexburg to stay with Mandy, Tyrel, and Ivan (Brad's sister and family), then head on to Yellowstone and take advantage of their free admission weekend! We had a blast, it was just what the doctor ordered. My sister, Rachel, came along with us since her hubby just left for India to study up in the Himalayas for 2 1/2 weeks. Have I mentioned she's expecting her first baby? Due the end of January and we are all VERY EXCITED! I haven't been to Yellowstone since I was about 2 so this was all a new experience for me. We saw the mud pots, geysers, Old Faithful, the Upper Falls, Artist's Point, the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, lots of Buffalo, Elk, and beautiful scenery!

We got to Old Fatihful at the perfect time. It was supposed to blow in the next 20 minutes or so, I was very impressed with the height of the blow!

We camped with the kids for the first time here. Kate enjoyed pushing her stroller around and getting dirty.

Daylen and Ivan enjoyed playing in the back of Brad's truck. They just randomly started singing "I love you" from Barney and giving each other hugs. These boys are so cute together!

After Uncle Tyrel's fun bedtime story we put the kids in bed and called it a night.

The kids did great, Daylen slept the whole night, Kate woke up a couple of times but I just snuggled with her on my tummy and she went right back to sleep. We didn't bring a pack 'n play for her so I'm glad it went as well as it did. I've decided next time I'm bringing some kind of mattress for me though, my hips just can't take the hard ground anymore.

Here we are at the Upper Falls. They look cool from here at the top, but don't seem quite as tall as they do from far away.

Here are the falls again from the Artist's Point and they look huge from here. Isn't that a georgous site! I can see why they call this the Artist's Point. Breathtaking.

This guy was standing right on the side of the road, not moving, just staring traffic down.

We rounded a corner and there were about 200 buffalo along both sides of the road. We got held up a few times by these guys walking down the road, right along side traffic or slowly leading the long train of cars down the middle of the lane. They think they own the place. :) After 2 days we only saw a fraction of Yellowstone, I think we would need a week to see everything there is to see there. Beautiful, super cool place to visit, highly recommend it if you haven't yet. Just beware, I didn't realized Yellowstone was a volcano about 50,000 years overdue for erruption, it could blow at ANY TIME. Really, you should go.