Christmas!

After our delicious Christmas Eve dinner of steak, twice baked potatoes and other yummy things, Phil let me open the present that he had been making for me. He was so excited that he just couldn't wait!

He had me wait in a separate room while he brought it in from the car. I also knew that he was waiting for his family to bring over another part of the gift. No one knows this but I was seriously so excited as I waited alone in the room. It was kind of ridiculous. I was like a little kid. Phil told his family to wait outside as I opened the first part of the gift. I opened it and found this. . . .

I remember seeing it, and immediately turning to the front door to see Phil's family walking up with this little cutie pie. . .

I was so excited and surprised. Phil knew that I wanted a little puppy, but I never asked for one (especially since we are living with his parents right now). The puppy kept us entertained for the rest of Christmas Eve as we cuddled with her and brainstormed names. Phil and I decided on Gracie!

For the first several days Gracie was such a cuddle bug. She loved to curl up around your neck and sleep and she loved being held. However, lately she wants to sleep in peace on her own. Gracie had this horrible habit of getting tired and falling asleep at like 8pm so she would sleep all evening and then she would be excited and want to play when Phil and I were ready to go to sleep. This made for a few nights with little sleep between the yapping and the potty breaks throughout the night. Phil and I then decided that the goal was to keep her awake between 7 and 10pm. Lets just say Gracie wasn't a fan of this plan. She was tired and just wanted to sleep. That's when she decided that she wasn't going to cuddle if she wanted to sleep. She figured out that she had a better chance of successfully sleeping is she was far away from human contact. Fortunately for us, sometimes she will still cuddle and we love it.

She has been such a good dog with potty training thus far. She has had a couple of accidents inside but she is good at trying to communicate when she has to go to the bathroom. For the past two nights she has gone about 6 hours without yapping to go potty. Phil and I have thoroughly enjoyed the sleep!

She seriously is the cutest little dog! We both just love her. How could you not love this face?!

Overall, Phil and I had a great Christmas. We slept at my parents on Christmas Eve and then got to go to church with both of our families on Christmas day! I loved having Christmas on Sunday this year. It was such a good opportunity to reflect on the Savior and the true meaning of Christmas. It allowed the focus of the day to be more on Christ and family, and less on presents. I loved it!

Homemade Christmas!

Phil and I have a tradition of giving each other a homemade gift as our main Christmas present to each other. This is something that Phil's family has always done and I love that we have also made it a tradition.

But here is the thing. . . I have this love/hate relationship with surprises. Especially when the surprised gets hyped up and everyone is telling me how much I'm going to love it!!! That just makes me want to know what it is even more! Phil has this habit of making me really incredible gifts. He also has a habit of telling me how excited he is and how he can't wait to give it to me, blah, blah, blah haha ;)

So it is six days until Christmas, and I'm wondering if I'm going to make it that long without knowing. I know that my gift is right on the other side of this make-shift barrier.

How easy would it be to go take a quick peek? I know right?! This is taking me a great deal of self-control. I keep telling myself, "I want it to be a surprise! I want it to be a surprise!" Hopefully this self hypnosis continues to work for the next 6 days. I make no promises ;)

Here are Phil's past gifts to me. . .

2008 Christmas dating: the biggest and comfiest blanket in the whole world.

We still use it on a daily basis!

2009--1st Christmas married: A beautiful case to hold my perfume!

2010 Christmas: It's not hanging in this picture but he carved this on his own!

I can't wait to see what Phil has in store this year.

No, but really. . . I CAN'T wait!!!!

Yep....

I finished my finals today!!!!

It was such a good feeling to check off all six of my finals in 4 days! I have now enjoyed approximately eight hours with absolutely no school hanging over my head. I love it! I also love thinking that I will NEVER again have to take finals before Christmas! Ok maybe I shouldn't say never. Getting a Masters degree someday is not out of the question ;) Ah but it's so nice!

On an unrelated note. . .we had an extended Lamoreaux family Christmas party last Sunday. Phil and I decided to give a little hamster as our white elephant gift. I told Phil we shouldn't name him because we would get attached. We named him anyways. . . And got attached.

He is so cute. His name is Pong because he is a Chinese hamster, plus the pet store sent him home in a Chinese food to-go box. Unfortunately, the game of white elephant means someone else takes him home. I miss Pong! haha

Thanksgiving Break!

Phil and I had such a great Thanksgiving break. We both just enjoyed time with family and did ZERO homework (that part proved to be a little stressful once classes started again).

The night before Thanksgiving, Phil and I made gingerbread houses with our friends Brandon and Melissa. We got a sweet gingerbread kit from Walmart, although the candy that came with it was disgraceful. We had a great time eating frosting and decorating our little village.

Phil and I set up our Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving. Before we set our little fake tree up, we helped Phil's family set up their massive real tree!

Phil did a great job on the ladder!

It was so fun to turn Christmas music on and decorate our tree. It definitely made me feel ready for Christmas. Now I just need to get through finals next week for the Christmas season to truly kick in!

DragonVale

So for quite some time now, Phil has been playing this game called DragonVale on his iPhone and his iPad. Until recently, I had no idea what the game was about, but I knew that it looked/sounded stupid. I didn't understand why Phil enjoyed it so much.

Before Thanksgiving break, Phil downloaded the game on my phone and I finally let him explain it to me (knowing full well that I would probably just delete it the next day). Well...that's not exactly what happened. I've become ADDICTED!!!! I still think it's kind of a stupid game, but it is a stupidly addicting game. Let me briefly explain.

The whole point is to breed and raise dragons! There pure bred dragons that you can buy and breed together in order to make hybrid dragons. You grow food and feed your dragons in order to increase their level (higher level=more benefits).

Although this game is addicting, it is not a super time consuming game. For example: Lets say I want to breed a Seaweed dragon. A Seaweed dragon is a hybrid from breeding a Water dragon and a Plant dragon. I select Water and Plant and send them to the "Breeding Cave." The breeding process for a Seaweed dragon takes 5 hours. So in 5 hours I come back to a Seaweed dragon egg. Now that egg has to sit for another 5 hours before it will hatch. Different dragons have different time frames ranging from 2-48 hours. So with this game, it is really easy to pull it up for a few minutes and then not have to worry about it for several hours (even though I do worry about it. I want my dragons to breed and hatch faster!)

See...stupid, yet oddly addicting. Try it!!

The really funny thing is that over Thanksgiving break Phil and I got my mom really into DragonVale. She is now just as addicted as I am. I've gotten a few random texts from her saying things like "I need dragon advice. Please call when you can." It's so funny! I'm now trying to get my sisters to play ha. We'll see!