New Year's Eve

We usually go to Tami's house to ring in the new year so we were over there for the first part of the night. All the cousins and siblings were there and we met some of John's kids and their families as well. Let off some fireworks and Gram LOVED it. Gavin was doing something with the fireworks and I think he lit the fence on fire? Something crazy like that happened. Gavin is sooo predictable! Haha. 

After partying there we headed over the Ben Whipple's house. He always has THE best parties. They had an open bar (no alcohol) and all the drinks were named the funniest things. They were pretty good too. We lit off fireworks in the church parking lot directly behind their house. We were chatting with Josue and Elba talking about our tiny baby bumps and what our babies will be like. Gram was so in love with this night, until he realized it was wayyy past his bedtime! 

2013 was a pretty tough year for the Guthrie family, but I was hopeful that 2014 would be one of our best year yet!

Christmas!! 2013

Christmas Eve we did a progressive dinner with the Guthrie side, as we do almost every year. First stop, our house for some hot chocolate and family pics by our tree. We decorated our tree in white, gold, silver with black and white presents. Next, we all headed to Mallory's new house for appetizers, and oh man, she had the best food! Shrimp, cheese ball, chicken wings, ect. We didn't even need dinner after that! Then, we headed over to Ashley's new house for soup and bread bowls. How did I get so lucky to marry into a family that can seriously cook?! Haha.

The final stop was Grandma Tami's house for Christmas jammies and exchanging gifts. This year the girls received red and black plaid jams, my favorite. The boys got Coke shirts and plaid pants. Gram got little plaid monkey jams. We just played around and took pictures by her massive tree. I recruited her visiting teachers to help Gram and I put it up and decorate it as kind of a Secret Santa thing. Later she told me she knew it was me. Haha. She's a sneaky one! She also did a very sneaky thing. She got married earlier that day and didn't even invite us! Ha.

Well it was time to head home, put Gram to bed and finish wrapping the rest of the presents. I finished early but Gavin wrapped until 2 or 3 in the morning. He said she tried to make each gift look perfect. Lol. I woke up in the middle of the night to snap pics of our presents under the tree and lay out my boys' stockings. So beautiful the house looks with all the sparkle and gifts.

The boys woke up and we did stockings first, then exchanged gifts. Gram got the best gift he has ever received... his very own trampoline!!! We LOVED seeing his face when he saw it. Gav had spent hours on it the night before putting it all together. Ben Coombs came over to help, too. We spent a good part of the morning jumping and laughing!

We then got ready for the day and headed over to my parents house to exchange gifts. I told my dad what time we were coming and they waited allll day to open their gifts until we got there. It was actually was pretty cool to watch each person open every single gift, give hugs and take pics. Haha the way they open gifts takes a verrrry long time but it was cute to join in on the tradition once more.

That afternoon I'm pretty sure we went to go see a movie with our friends, like we usually do on Christmas Day. I can't remember since it has taken me almost a year to blog about that day!

Great holiday with my great family! I was about 4-5 months pregnant with our next addition to our family, too!

2013 Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving would be the first year without Sam so as a Guthrie family we knew it was important to still go to the traditional Thanksgiving Day breakfast. Bill, Sam's brother, also passed away from cancer this year so we were able to support his family as well. 

Gram had fun chasing his favorite cousins around (the Mackey girls) in the woods. The adults sat around the campfire looking at the ads for all the Black Friday deals as usual. It was a quieter day than the past Thanksgiving breakfasts but Gavin and Trevor were stirring up all kinds of commotion talking about the 80" flat screens that they wanted. Boys will be boys! 

After breakfast we went home to shower and went to Thanksgiving dinner at Tami's house. The boys were trying to figure out how to buy their big screens and the girls were planning out all the stores they were going to hit. I never go any where on Black Friday (the midnight shopping) because I am either pregnant or have a small baby to tend to. This year we just walked around San Tan Mall to see if they had any cool deals. We met up with Tami, Aunt Robin, Ashley and Mallory, too.

During this time my brother, Howard, was in town with his new fiance, Seneca. They stayed a couple nights with us and a couple nights with my parents. Howard is always fun to hang out with because he brings the party to my parents house! Seneca fits right in with the family so it was good seeing her as well!

We're Having a Baby Girl!

The very last present Gram opened up at his birthday party was a bunch or shirts saying, "Big Brother" on them. Secret is out!! We are having an other little bundle of joy! I was almost 14 weeks at that point so we were in the "safe zone" as I call it. Everyone was shocked and kind of confused. Haha but everyone was very excited for us! 

I was able to find the midwife that delivered Gram on Facebook and followed her to her new office, MomDoc Midwives in Gilbert. How crazy is it that she moved to an office just 5 minutes from my new house?! I was so excited when I found out that I had a chance of using her again. 

I remembered when I first figured out I was pregnant. I was nauseous for 2 days and on Sunday I woke up, rolled out of bed and headed to Walmart for a pregnancy test. I thought it was a good excuse to go to the store on Sunday, I just HAD to know!! So after the test was positive I gave it to Gram to surprise Daddy with. We woke him up and Gram handed him the stick. He didn't read it correctly and thought I wasn't pregnant. Dang it. After I explained that I was he was very excited for us!!

At our 18 week appointment we had our 2nd ultrasound and they told us it was a girl!! I think all the hormones made me cry because I was so scared to have a girl! (I was scared that I would have a hard time bonding with her because I have always had trouble connecting with other women.) I was trying to be tough so everyone wouldn't bother me about why I was crying. It took us until the next day to share what the gender was. After that I started getting VERY excited to have a little princess of my own!

Gram's Monster Party!!

My little monster is growing up! I can't believe he's already two years old! Which now that I think about it, that's not very old. He's still my baby.

We of course had to throw him a HUGE monster bash! I love throwing parties but I especially love throwing parties for my little prince.

I thought a monster theme would be perfect for this little man to kick off his terrible twos! Haha. It also was cute that his birthday is right before Halloween.

I had an awesome time planning his party and getting everything ready. We had everyone over to our new house for a monster bash. The party was from 4-6 but our last guests didn't leave til 9! It was that fun ;) We had food and desserts to match the theme: Monster Smiles, Monster Teeth, Monster Cookies, Monster Fingers and Toes, Ect. He had a big, green monster cake with several eyeballs sticking out of the top! Then I had made little brightly colored cupcakes with shifty eyes to match. We set up a bounce house, tables and chairs outside. There was even face painting, too! 400 of our closest friends and family attending this celebration. Now that I'm writing this all down it seems a bit much for a 2 year-old's birthday party!

It was all worth it seeing Gram strut around like he was the coolest kid in the neighborhood (and duh! He is!) His little ego puffs up and it's the funniest, cutest thing. I love my little guy more than words can express, so I was glad to see he enjoyed being the center of attention.

After playing around and enjoying some yummy food it was time to open the gifts! Gram got so many great presents including a bike, race cars, new clothes, jammies and many more. At the end of the gift giving Gram opened one more gift bag that had shirts saying "Big Brother" on them. Yep, it's true, Gram is going to have a little baby sibling!!

On Gram's actual b-day I took him to the pumpkin patch with our friends Meagan and Jane. They had bounce houses, hay rides and pumpkin decorating there! He loved the hay rides the most since it was his first time ever on one.

I'm so glad I was able to make Gram feel so special on his big day! I live for making that kid happy.  

Jeep Grand Cherokee 2014

July 31st, 2013

Gavin bought me my first real car!! 

I have never picked out my own car before. Gavin usually does that (because he's the man and all) but this time I got to choose my dream car and go down to the dealership and pick it out! 

It was time to get me a "mom car" aka SUV so we began the search. Of course I didn't really need an SUV with my one child, but Gav just likes to have all the nice things. We went and looked at the Pilot, 4Runner and something else. Then when we went to Jeep we just KNEW this was our vehicle. 

The inside is beautiful and has a clean look. Not to mention the largest touch screen on the market ;) My favorite color is black so I was ecstatic when they had a black on black (with leather, eek!) Jeep in stock!

So... I didn't realize we were actually buying a new car, especially when our cars were in great condition. It's always just fun to look around. One night I thought we were going to Chandler mall for date night then Gav said he just wanted to talk to the guy down at the Jeep dealership. We went there and after they got to talking I guess we were getting a new car?? Haha luckily Gav has great judgement and got us the perfect family car because I should have been paying more attention for such a huge purchase. That's where husbands really come in handy :)  

Needless to say I have been very appreciative of Gavin and his hard work. He has been loving his career choice as a loan officer at Academy Mortgage and all his hours there are paying off! Thanks Gavin! We love you and our "Jeep car!" 

Robert Samuel Guthrie

2012 and 2013 have been rough years for the Guthrie clan. My sweet father-in-law was diagnosed with brain cancer in July of 2012. This came to us all as a very big shock because he was only 56 years old. He passed away exactly a year later from the day he was diagnosed.  

He has been an incredible example of what it means to truly be selfless and have unconditional love for others. He was an incredible spouse who would do absolutely anything for Tami. He spent his life remodeling and fixing up their homes just to make her smile. He would go to the ends of the earth to help any of his children or in-laws and pretty much did just that very often. Sam would always give you a rough time about him having to go fix your car in the middle of the desert at midnight but he was secretly loving having to help. 

He had an extremely strong testimony of the church and lived his entire life according to our beliefs. He served a mission in New York and married Tami in the temple. He had a Christ-like love for his children and showed them that as he parented them. 

Gram had a special part in Sam's heart and Sam in his. They loved playing around together or just snuggling watching TV. Sam called him "Cowboy" and Gram called Sam "Pop Pops." They were the sweetest little buddies and will be again in Heaven. 

We love Sam and the legacy he left behind.