Holiday greetings from Florida

Just enjoying the Warm Florida Sun in December. Having a white Christmas is cool and all, but we enjoy making sand angels over snow angels. Weather has been in the 80's and no rain. We will enjoy it while we can. California, here we come in a few days.

Aventura Kids Club

So I made a discovery today. I had seen at the mall the other day that there was some kind of kids activity this morning. I got the kids ready and went. It was so great! At the play place they do a singing and dancing thing followed by story time and more dancing. Bryant loved it so much. I guess they have different characters come. This week was Strawberry Shortcake. The libraries here don't have decent story times according to my Provo high standards. (Provo had excellent ones.) This was very similar and just as active and fun. And just for joining the club they give you a t-shirt and an activities list. I am very excited about this if you didn't notice.

Then we walked around our pretty mall and checked out the trains.

It was such a good morning!

Santa Visit at Bass Pro Shop

At the Bass Pro Shop this year, they were offering a free Santa picture as a way to get customers in the store. Paul, some friends, and I all went a week or so ago and missed Santa by 10 or 15 min. So yesterday a couple of us decided to go back without the husbands (them being so busy and all) and try again. Well this time we undershot it. We were an hour early. We just decided to stick it out and play around with all the fun toys they had out for the kids.

After playing inside for 45 min the kids (well mostly us parents) got restless in the store so we walked around outside for a bit and ran into some good photo ops and some giant iguanas.

Before too long it was time to see Santa. As you can imagine, children who were happy about an hour ago when we got there, were now pretty tired and crabby. Bryant was so excited still!

Bryant marched right up to Santa and asked, "will you pick me up please." Santa agreed and as you can see, me adding Briley to the mix didn't go over so well. Bryant told Santa he wanted a tato toy, which I'm sure he didn't understand, but he discovered a Mr potato head set we had hiding in the closet and that's all he talks about now. Santa's only reply back was to please leave chocolate chip cookies. They are his favorite ya know!

On the way out Bryant decided to conquer his fear of the giant shark outside and take a few pictures. Briley once again, not so much.

Open for Business everyone!

My 1 1/2 year long battle is finally over. Before we moved here in June of 2008, I applied for a Florida Esthetics license so I could work a bit from home as we needed extra money. (Which is always by the way.) When we got here I had to take an HIV course and get some paper work from Utah about my education and turn it in to Florida state. Then my license never came, and never came, so I called and bugged them. They said it was in the mail and to call in a month if I didn't receive it. So I did and they told me the same thing. They even gave me a date on when to expect it. Turns out that they never got my change of address form and were sending my license over and over to Utah. So I sent in another change of address, so on and so on..... Finally 3 weeks ago I faxed in a sheet to board of directors for cosmetology that had my real address and kind of a snotty "I still haven't gotten my license" statement on it. Never heard back so I called again. This time, again, they said it was in the mail. I originally applied in April of 2008 and FINALLY today I got my License. Halle-freakin-lujah!!!
So now,another battle with Florida Government won, I welcome all of you Floridians to make your appointments. I do facials, waxing of every kind, and pedicures. You can call me and I can give you my pricing info. Can't wait to get started and am so excited that I got my license in a timely manner, huh! Next Battle, cash assistance. Wish me luck!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving this year was spent with some great friends. We were able to rent a space for very cheap, to have everyone be able to have it together. We had a ton of awesome food and all came home feeling twice our weight.

High chairs are amazing. Lets just start out by saying how thankful I am for them. We had a nice peaceful dinner without the constant tug at the leg. Briley is a pretty big begger.

The pool table was a hit with the kids. The adults never really got to use it, but it kept them busy so that was nice. There was a big tv in the corner which, as you can imagine, kept the men pretty busy watching football.

Briley and some of the kids her age spent their time along the wall of mirrors. She played with her reflection like it was a long lost friend.

The amazing chefs for the evening.

All of these guys are in the podiatry program with Paul except 2 and that's not even all of them in our ward. We had a great time and hope it will be just as good next year too.

What to do?!

I've been having a little trouble keeping Mr. Bryant busy and not in trouble. A friend suggested a bunch of things for me to try out and so far it has been fun. The idea both kids seemed to love was a trip to the pet store. The pictures are of that, but we also go to the library once a week, park time is always a hit and just going down the street to the beach to play in the sand. (that doesn't happen often. Going to the beach with both kids by myself is kind of a chore.) Sorry thew pictures on these next few posts might be bad, but my cell phone is ready to die and I guess so is its picture quality.