Neu Christmas Treats

Our first Christmas together, I asked Jeff what were some Neu family traditions. Us Anderson's are really into traditions and have a lot around the holiday season, so I wanted to make sure to incorporate some of Jeff's family traditions. The only one Jeff told me about was that they made spritz cookies. Not a whole lot to work with, but we made them that first year.

Well, Sharon and Ben (Jeff's Sister and Brother in-law) joined us for Christmas this year and Sharon shared a few more Neu family traditions. According to Sharon, her parents would buy tons of baklava and petifores to eat over the holidays. Sharon bought some for us to munch on this year. All I have to say is I'm totally behind this tradition! The baklava was amazing! I will make sure we repeat this next year!

Cohen's First Christmas

I'm so happy that my family could be here for Cohen's first Christmas! We had a fun time opening presents Christmas morning and eating a delicious (not so traditional) Christmas dinner! Cohen slept through the whole things, so I'm sure he enjoyed the day too.

Cohen got some nice presents. Lots of books!

Dad (aka Grandpa) gave Cohen a Tonka dump truck. I laughed because clearly Cohen can't play with it and the minimum age for the toy is three! Dad told me the he has always wanted to buy a Tonka truck for his grandson, because they are the best trucks! Dad wanted to make sure that he got a chance to do it! Some of you may not know, but my dad was in a bike accident in April. We are lucky to still have him with us and I think we all realized how precious life is and we really shouldn't procrastinate the things we really want to do.

What did we have for dinner? Well, for Jeff and my first Christmas we stayed home (and no family came to visit), so we decided to not go with the traditional Christmas dinner and decided to made ribs. Since I convinced Jeff to registered for china for our wedding and we ended up getting all of it, we also decided to use it for our first Christmas dinner. Yes, we ate ribs on china! We decided that that would be our family tradition! Luckily our families were ok with jointing us this year.

Kari and mom set the table and did an amazing job!

Christmas with Grandma!

Mom arrived on at JFK on Christmas Day at 5:15AM! It was an early christmas morning but totally worth it. Mom was so excited to see Cohen. She says he's her little friend. :)

Cohen slept most of the morning :) Maybe next year he will be awake to help open his presents.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you all have a wonderful day!

Kari helped me decorate the house this year. I really didn't have many decorations so we had to go out and buy a few. It was fun transforming the house. Special thanks to Mom for making my stockings (new one for Cohen!), tree skirt, matching throw blanket, and wall hanging!

While decorating the tree I noticed that almost all my ornaments were given to me by family members and a lot of them were homemade! It looks like Grandma A gets the award for the most ornaments and she made every single one she gave me! Grandma A use to make a new ornament and attach them to our gifts. I'm just so glad that my mom saved them in a box for me over the years. Mom saved all the ornaments that people gave me and the ones we use to make on Thanksgiving (We use to have a tradition of making an angel Christmas ornament on Thanksgiving)

I think the tree looks a little bare, but it's ok. We will work on filling it slowly over the coming years.

and the best Christmas gift this year…

Grandpa's here!

Dad (aka Grandpa) has arrived. I'm so excited to have my family here for Christmas.

Now we are only missing Ben and Sharon (Brother in-law and Sister in-laws) and my mom (aka GRANDMA).

It's going to be a full house, but a fun one!

It's been fun watching Dad play with Cohen. I'm so grateful that Cohen will get to spend some quality time with his grandparents (even though he won't remember, I will have the pictures!)

Auntie Harmizzle is in town!

My family will be celebrating Christmas in New Jersey with us this year! I'm really excited to have them here for Cohen's first Christmas, but I'm going to miss going home and seeing my cousins, aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents. I've only missed Christmas with them a couple of times and each time hasn't been easy.

Kari came out a couple of week early to help with Cohen and to hang out and have fun. :) Kari really is one of my best friends and I always have such a good time when she's around.

Words cannot even begin to describe how awesome Kari has been. She has helped me so much with Cohen. She feeds him, changes him (even the nasty poopy diapers), helps me soothe him when he gets fussy, and even takes naps with him. I don't know what I'm going to do when she leaves. I'm so grateful for her!

Kari said she wants to be the "Best Aunt Ever" and I totally think she has earned that title after what she's done the past two weeks. Cohen and I are both so lucky to have her in our lives.

P.S. We decided that she will be Auntie Harmizzle since I have a sister in-law also named Kerrie (even though it's spelled different). For those of you that don't know, Kari's camp name was Harmony. At some point someone called her Harmizzle and that stuck). We are curious to see how Cohen ends up pronouncing it. 

Bye Bye Garage!

Some of you may not know this, but my husband and I bought the house he grew up in. We have been slowly making updates to the house to make it our own and we're making some good progress. This summer we replaced all the windows on the first floor, had the heating system updated and central a/c installed. Awesome!

A little over a year ago we discovered that the back corner of one of our garages was sinking and the wall was cracking. We decided not to do anything about it until a couple of months ago when we saw how bad it was getting and realized it wasn't safe. So, we had the whole thing taken down. What's cool about this project is that the bricks used to make the garage were originally from a retaining wall on the property and were repurposed when the house was built and used for the garage. Jeff decided to use the brick for the fire pit he has been wanting for so long. The workers took down the garage brick by brick. It was quite impressive.

I haven't taken pictures of Jeff's fire pit yet, but I will try to take some when we get a nice sunny day. I wonder how long I will wait for that?

Girls Camp 2013 - Oh, the Places You'll Go!

I know this is totally late, but better late than never, right?

In October, I was released from my calling in the Young Women's presidency. I was sad to leave the girls, but I'm now a youth Sunday School teacher so I still get to spend time with them (once I start going back to church)

I didn't go to the full week of Girls Camp again this year. Sleeping up there with the bad mattresses and having to walk to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night didn't sound fun to me while being three months pregnant. I did get to spend a day up there with the girls which of course was a good time.

The theme this year was "Oh, the Places You'll Go!" It was such a cute theme! The girls decorate the cabin with little direction signs and lights. Our center pieces for our table (every ward makes a centerpiece to mark their table) was supposed to be a bear dressed as a Lorax, but I have to admit it turned out creepy :) I can say that because I made it! I think it looked better in theory and not so hot in execution.

I just love these girls! They are such a good time and love camp so much.

On the day I went up they had the Bishopric races (Maybe it's suppose to be Bishop races. I'm not 100% sure). Basically they have a member from each wards bishopric come up and compete in a series of water games and then generally a big water fight breaks out. A member from our bishopric couldn't make it, but luckily the spanish branch sent two so they shared with us :)

Happy One Month Birthday Cohen!

I can't believe he's already a month old. How did that happen?!

I've been trying to do little photo shoots with Cohen, but tends to be uncooperative whenever I try to take a picture of him. The cutest pictures are of him sleeping, but I can't get him to sleep when I have him set up for the picture. He's just so alert! Then I pick him up and he falls right asleep. I shouldn't be surprised. He was not very cooperative when we were trying to get ultra sound pictures either. Why would be be cooperative outside, right?

Cohen at 1 Month

10lb 3oz

21 1/4in

What day is it?

The most asked question in our house these days is….what day is it? I'm currently losing all track of time! At least once a day I'm asking Jeff what day it is. I feel like they are all running together at this point. :)

I think I'm finally starting to get the hang of things now. Well, I don't think I will ever fully get the hang of things, but at least I feel like I'm getting things under control.

Cohen is such a good little baby! Sure he has his fussy stints, but more often then not he's very content just sitting with us.

I'm currently having a problem with out of control hair (the picture below doesn't do it justice). After I give him a bath his hair sticks straight up and there is nothing I can do to get it to stay down. Any suggestions on controlling baby hair?

Cohen totally has Jeff's hair :) Out of control!

Well, it's been a long, Been a long, been a long, Been a long day.

Maybe my post title should be "it's been a long week," but that's not how the song goes :) (Can anyone name the broadway show?)

Ok, so it's been a long time since I have been on here.  I guess with work, being pregnant, getting the baby room ready, and making other random updates to the house, I have neglected my blogging. I hope to make it up over the next couple of months, but no promises :)

But the big news is (if you haven't already heard) I had my baby!

Cohen Anderson Neu

I think last week was the longest week of my life. Luckily my mom came out for two weeks to help get the Cohen's room ready and help me get adjusted post delivery. I really wish she could have stayed longer. This mom business is hard work.

Neu Family Reunion 2013: Part II - Tea Party and Surprise Baby Shower

During the Family reunion we had a Tea Party in honor of Mom Neu. Well, at least that was what I was told prior to arriving. When I got there I was told it was also a baby shower for me. :) I was totally surprised! It was such a good time. My sister in-laws really went all out.

Then some of my nieces delighted us with a little fashion show and a musical number. It was awesome.

Then I opened some gifts. I got some really cute baby clothes, an amazing quilt and matching bag, books, and some adorable hand mad burp cloths.

We then spent the remainder of the time asking Mom Neu questions about her courtship with Dad Neu.

It was a lovely party!

Neu Family Reunion 2013: Part I - Hotel and Cafe Rio!

Last month Jeff and I traveld out to Utah for the Neu Family Reunion! This reunion was extra special because it was also Jeff's parents 50th wedding anniversary. We had a lovely party at the end of the reunion in Salt Lake City. I have pictures from the event and the little family photo-shoot before, which I will be sharing next week. I took so many pictures that I have to figure out which ones to put up. :)

It was a nice relaxing week in Utah. Jeff and I stayed at the Stein Erikson Lodge in Park City which was wonderful because it was so much cooler up there. For the first three days of the week we spent the mornings lounging by the pool. It was absolutely lovely. I spent hours in the pool. I was so sad when it was time to get out. We really enjoyed staying in Park City.

Cafe Rio! So, many of you know my obsession with Cafe Rio. Whenever I'm within a reasonable driving distance from one I simply insist on going. Jeff and I went three times while in Utah. The first time was at 9:55pm driving from the airport to the hotel. Yeah, I'm that committed. I feel that three times in five days is not quite enough, but I'm still grateful that I got to go as much as I did. Jeff is such a great sport for giving in to my Cafe Rio desires. Oh, Cafe Rio! How I love you!

Trek 2013

Every four years the youth in our stake go off on an adventure that we affectionately call Trek. Basically the youth dress up as pioneers and push/pull handcarts for several miles as a little reenactment of the Mormon pioneers that migrated across the United States to Utah.

I never hat the opportunity to do this as a youth so I was very intrigued by the trip. Jeff and I were thinking about being a Ma and Pa (leaders of one of the groups of youth), but we had to turn down the chance after we found out I was pregnant. I don't know why but walking for several miles in the heat of summer while being 24 weeks pregnant didn't sounds like a good time to me.

However, I was able to convince Jeff to go up and visit the kids last Friday. I was a little disappointed when we showed up and most of the youth were no longer in their pioneer clothes. I really don't blame them since it was like 100 degrees and humid and they had walked over 10 miles pushing the heavy handcarts. We spent the evening up there watching their evening entertainment. All the families took some time to sing a song about their travels. It ended up turning into a little open mic night with a few jokes, Shakespeare, and dancing. It was a really good time and I'm glad I went.

I'm just so impressed by these youth! It was such a hot and long trip, but when we saw them they were in good spirits and most glad that they made the trek. :)