Maya's First Christmas!

Oh what a Merry Christmas we had this year!  We wish you the merriest Christmas too!  This Christmas was a very special one for our little family because it was Maya's very first Christmas!  She sure loved every minute of it!

On Christmas Eve we got to start some new family traditions!
* Maya opened a present which had some new pajamas for her to wear that night.
* Maya opened a second present which included 2 Christmas books for us to read together.
* We re-told the nativity story as a family with Maya's new nativity. 

On Christmas morning Maya came out to see what Santa brought, then Rachael's
parents came for breakfast, and she opened the rest of her presents.  Then we went
to Rachael's parents' house for lunch and more presents! 

It was the perfect day!  We are so blessed to have Maya!  She is our whole world and she really makes every day a celebration for our little family!
Merry Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas

To say we are extremely excited for Christmas this year is an understatement ... and to say Maya is getting spoiled rotten this year (by everyone) is also an understatement. :-)  We can't wait!

I love dressing Maya for the season!  I even found this Christmas sweater I wore as a baby!
I'm sure my sisters wore it too!

Picking out our Christmas Tree in the snow

We found the perfect tree for us!

Maya insisted on being right by her daddy while he set up the tree!

My side of the family had a "Ugly Sweater and Mustache Christmas party" - it was a hoot!  Maya didn't have an ugly sweater to wear, so we put her in this cute one -- but she rocked the mustache on her binky!

Ready for the party!

Brandon grew his own mustache, I had to improvise!  And my ugly sweater had flashing lights!

The tree is up and lights are on!  And (again) I love putting Maya in a few of my old clothes!

Maya loves to play by the tree (with the cat always watching). 

Checking out her very own nativity. 

Not too sure about Santa - but no tears either!  What a girl!

Merry Christmas!

Maya's 2nd Trip to Disneyland!

Yes - this girl is only 7 months old and has gone to Disneyland TWICE!

We can't believe it ourselves, it just happened to work out!  It helps that this time my parents were going, so Maya and I invited ourselves along for the ride and hotel stay!  And what's even better is that my sister and her family came too!

Me, Maya and my parents - ready to go into the park!

All of the kids - they were so excited!

Maya was dressed for the occasion every day of the trip!
She even had bibs to match her outfits for when she drank her bottles! ;)

My little 'bug' in 'Bugs Land'

Maya got to meet a lot of characters!
Princess Tiana, Tinkerbell, Fawn the fairy,
Minnie Mouse, Princess Ariel and Mickey Mouse

Maya's all-time favorite was Mickey Mouse!  I think mostly because she watches Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and recognized him!  She couldn't stop staring and was dancing the whole time!

Toon Town and Mickey's house

My little fairy Maya

Goodbye Disneyland!  We can't wait to come back!

 I'm already dreaming of when we can go back!  We had the best time ever!

Our Forever Family!

Guess what happened in mid October?!?  Our adoption was finalized!  Most people finalize at a courthouse in front of a judge - but in our family, we finalize via text message! LOL!

Once we got the finalization paperwork in the mail we could start planning our very special day - being sealed together forever in our temple!  (If you don't know much about our temples or about our church you can learn more at mormon.org).  We were sealed in the temple on November 9th.

Best day ever!

Pic from my sister Amy

Pic from my sister Natalie

And we had fun celebrating after too - we all went to my parents' church where Brandon gave Maya a beautiful blessing and we had a luncheon to celebrate the day!

This is Maya's sealing dress she wore to the temple.
And the beautiful shawl made by my Grandma Maya was wrapped in for the blessing.

This is the blessing dress I wore when I was blessed,
Maya wore this blessing dress too!  So special!

Everything was pink, we had a fun 'Make Your Own Party Drink' table, Candy Cabobs,
My sister Amy made adorable cupcakes, and everyone wrote a special note to Maya.

We couldn't have asked for a better day!  Our hearts are so full to have our baby girl forever!  Oh, and I made this little slide-show that we showed at the luncheon too - just another way to celebrate our girl!

Happy Halloween

Oh what a fun Halloween we had!

First little Halloween Ourfit

It's so fun to celebrate Maya's FIRST everything!  We are so lucky to be able to see the world through a whole new set of eyes as parents!

First visit to the Pumpkin Patch

Hanging out with her cousins

Celebrating Grandpa's birthday!
First time dressing up and first time carving pumpkins!

What a wonderful holiday!

Disneyland!

Welcome to our happy place!

Photo courtesy of our PhotoPass

We had so much fun on our trip!  It was so fun that it was hard to come back home!  It was a great way to spend our 4th wedding anniversary and celebrate our family!  Get ready for a picture overload!

Disneyland:

Maya was a great little traveler, the weather was perfect and we had a blast!

In front of Sleeping Beauty's Castle and at the Entrance to Disneyland. 

Me, Maya (as Tinkerbell), and Dumbo.

Us with the Walt & Mickey statue, and ToonTown

Our all-time favorite pic!  Makes me cry!
We hoped to find Princess Tiana and there she was the first day - they loved each other!

Disneyland was all decorated for Halloween!

Pluto and Maya loved each other!  He came over to her and got her attention,
she was so excited -- and he was so cute, let Maya grab is nose and face!

Maya got all dressed up for the Princess Lunch -- it was a riot!  Maya could spot the
Princesses across the room and complained until they got to her - then she was happy!

Shopping Fun!  You can't go to Disneyland and not shop your heart out in the great stores for all of the fun Disney items!

Of course we had to get Maya her first set of Disney ears!

California Adventure:

Maya was a good little napper - I think we wore her out good each day!

Cars Land was AWESOME!  Looks straight out of the movie!
Photo courtesy of our PhotoPass

I love our little family!

There were a lot of rides Maya could get on!  Maya thought she owned the place!

Our little Sleeping Beauty had no idea that Donald Duck came to say 'hi' to her. 

All-in-all it was a perfect trip!  We can't wait to start planning our next visit to Disneyland!