... that we are old pros?

At marriage, that is.

We celebrated three years at the Melting Pot this year. And it was extremely delicious.

I love being married!

... that it was New Year's Eve?

We are super popular, so obviously we were invited to several New Year's Eve parties.

First up was a party with some old friends from our last ward. It was so good to see them again! We had fondue and continued their tradition of making a New Year's Eve music video.

After that, we headed over to the parents' house to hang out with Kim and Tracy! We did some karaoke and watched "Magic in the Moonlight" (a cheesy Rom Com) which we paused just long enough to watch the ball drop. I'm pretty sure I was the only one who saw the whole thing, everyone else fell asleep! We are party animals.

The only pictoral evidence of our New Year's celebrating:

The traditional Harrison New Year's Eve turnovers. Delicious.

I love the New Year!

... that it was Christmastime!

I was a little sad that we weren't able to stay in California for Christmas, but I did love getting our little apartment ready for the holidays! We set up our clearance Christmas tree from last year for the first time

And of course my favorite little Christmas tree as well

Kar got me all inspired with her homemade wreaths and I whipped this beauty up, which I am quite proud of if I do say so myself.

Then we wanted to share some Christmas Cheer with our friends, so Matt and I decided to make treats. It's kind of a Harrison tradition to make candy and caramel for the neighbors, so Matt made caramel and I wanted to make peppermint Christmas cookies.

So cute, right??

WRONG.

Biggest. Fail. Ever. But did it stop us from giving them to people? You bet it didn't! We covered the whole pan in white chocolate drizzle and peppermint chunks, cut it into squares, and nobody even knew about my shame. So really, it was a win for everyone. Yeah, let's just go with that.

I didn't have time to redo the cookies anyway, I was way behind on making my stocking stuffers, as per usual

It wouldn't be Christmas Eve if I wasn't up all night long finishing up presents. But it was worth it! Homemade rice socks for everyone!!!

We had a pretty good Christmas this year, even if we knew most of the presents we were getting because they were all bought in Vegas on Black Friday. We opened our presents at home, then spent the rest of the day at the parents' house. We even brought Xena a Christmas bone.

She was thrilled.

I think the fun of Black Friday really got to me, because it awoke my inner love for post-holiday-deal shopping.

Ever since I can remember, my mom has revered the week after Christmas. Every year right after Christmas, she hits up every single Hallmark store in the surrounding area and gets all of the adorable holiday items on clearance! She buys enough gifts and trinkets for all her friends and family, then she puts them all away in a box and saves them until next year. Then when Christmas comes around again, she already has all of her Christmas shopping done, and she gets a great deal on it all! Genius, right? Well, the Black Friday bug bit me hard, cause all I wanted to do after Christmas was shop for deals! I think I was also missing my mom, cause I saw this little Christmas countdown calendar and it reminded me of one that my mom always hung up at Christmastime at our house, and I couldn't resist it!

I also spent a month (or maybe two... or three...) going to every Walgreens and Walmart in the Salt Lake Valley looking for all sorts of ridiculous knick knacks and trinkets to hoard away until next year, including this little cheese plate

I looked high and low for this particular cheese plate. It became an absolutely ridiculous obsession, cause I couldn't find it anywhere. And I seriously looked EVERYWHERE. I eventually gave up on it after wasting waaaaaaay too much time and gas.

And then I found it 3 months later at a DI for $1.

I love Christmas!

... that there were the Blickenstaffs!!!!!!!!!!!

They did it!!!!!

Newport Beach Temple
December 13, 2014

The ring ceremony afterwards at Soka Peace Fountain

And the reception!

We love our only brother so much!

Even if sometimes he doesn't love us back as much.

Congrats to the Blickenstaffs!!!

... that it was almost wedding time?

We had so much wedding prep and so little time!!!

First priority: Make absolutely ridiculous amounts of puppy chow with the cutest little helper you can find.

CHECK.

Kell and I made 5 gallons, and I believe Francie and Katie also made 5 gallons each. We know how to party.

(Side note: I'm pretty sure that approximately 3 gallons of it were actually eaten at the reception sooooo... Let's just say we were giving bags away to anyone who would make eye contact with us at the end of the night. 15 gallons of chex mix well spent hahahahaha)

We had all decided to stay in Orange County the night before the wedding, since we had the wedding dinner down there the night before and the wedding in the morning. Matt and I scored a great hotel room and dropped off all of our stuff with just a little bit of time left over to relax... or so we thought. After a few frantic phone calls and a little bit of wild goose chasing running errands with Mom, we finally headed over to the wedding dinner at Lucille's BBQ.

(Once again, Jake, it was NOT our fault that we were late. Okay? Okay.)

These two.

All the heart eyes.

Matt and I hid in the back with the other naughty kids and just ate ribs to our hearts content! Jake and Jacky traded in their wedding toasts for wedding roasts and it was quite an entertaining evening. Just Jake and Jacky's style and such a great way to have fun!

I'm soooooo glad Cait is back to ruin all of my pictures.

Blickensisters!

After the dinner, Jacky needed us girls to go over to the house to help with some last minute wedding stuff. So we headed over to her house to find this:

All of her friends feverishly making bouquets and corsages in the dark. The power in Jacky's whole neighborhood was out! We helped as best we could for a little while by cell phone/candle light, then finally gave up and hauled everything over to a neighbor's house who had power to finish the job! I could not believe how much of this wedding Jacky and her friends had done on their own... Probably saved them a fortune! I was pretty impressed. But also pretty tired. We finished waaaaaaay too late and stumbled back to our hotel rooms completely exhausted. Let's get to the actual party already!

... that we got to go home!!!!!

Finally it was time to go home and get ready for the wedding!!!

We drove to Vegas and spent the night there to break up the trip. We just can't get enough of those Williams! I had to do a little work that morning before we finished the drive and the Williams' internet was out, so a stop at Coffee Bean it was!!!

It was a good thing I got my work out of the way beforehand, because once we got to California, it was all play time!!!

Uncle Mott LOVES to play dress up hahahahahahahahaha!

Sister couldn't turn her neck: her necklace could fall off at any moment. But we couldn't have too much play time, because we had to go pick up our missionaries!!!!!

SO wonderful!!! We even stopped at Tito's on the way home per Mom's request... even if we did forget the extra cilantro and onions at home! Oops! It is so great to have Caitlin home safe finally, I missed having two sisters here in Utah SO MUCH! We only had so much time with Mom, so we squeezed as much in one week as we could! Including a trip to the house for some tangerines,



Lots of snuggles,


And a trip to visit Courtney's grave

Matt and I have been married three years and I have never taken him out to the cemetery. I always tell myself whenever we go home that I need to go out there, but I get so wrapped up in seeing family that I forget to go out there. This time I finally remembered, and I was really really glad that Matt finally got to share that little part of my life with me.

I also got to visit one of my oldest friends from elementary school for another quick Coffee Bean run. My Mally is just the cutest, sweetest, most beautiful mommy-to-be ever!!!!!


And of course we had to do some pre-wedding beauty prep as well:

Those teeth aren't gonna whiten themselves.

I love being home!!!!!