Our First Christmas

2010 was a wonderful year for Seth and I

--We got engaged (even though that wasn't the funest time for Ol Vic and myself-we worked it out)

--Seth and Zach graduated college and high school.

--Laurie and Joseph Dyches were wed on 6-19-10--Fun.

--We were married 8-15-10 :)-A day made wonderful by the help of ALL my family members!

--We packed up and moved to Utah right after our wedding.  We have seen so many beautiful landscapes and met so many great people!

--We were able to go home and visit with our families (that we haven't seen in 4 months!)

2011 will surely be a great year!  We are looking forward to spending it in Utah-enjoying all its scenery-national parks-and surrounding states!  We are also looking forward to all the visitors we are hopefully expecting :).

The Cook's first Christmas was wonderful-we were able to spend it at our homes in SC.  After a full day of traveling with the jitters and 4 months of built up excitement we finally landed and raced off the plane to see my parents and one of Seth's best friends (Jay).  I, of course, ran to my folks and Seth ran to Jay :).  It was a wonderful homecoming.  We traveled to a Cracker Barrel and got to see Eason & Brittany-Zach & Karla-and Seth's lovely parents :)!  Our week had started off perfect!

Troupe (my pup) was soo excited to see us :).  He did his excitement pee and we wore him out playing that evening!  I miss him and I see a custody battle erupting between my father and I when we return to SC and want Troupe back.  My dad absolutely loves that dog to death-and he worries about him maybe more than he did with Eason and I!

Our little Cook Family :).

Seth and I thoroughly enjoyed being able to be the 'kids' again at both of our parent's homes.  We didn't have any major obligations-chores-responsibilities.  We had our parents with us to take care of us at all times and we were able to just relax.  That was probably one of the best things!  Coming back to Utah-we noticed that we both had to 'grow' up a little bit-we were back to our adult world that we were able to leave behind for a week :).

Cook's/Cutsinger's

                         Cook's Fireplace                       Cook's Christmas Dinner

My first Christmas with the Cook's was a lot of fun.  We were able to visit with Seth's family in Camden one day.  Mrs. Cynthia and Emily made a very yummy Christmas dinner for us and we all enjoyed sitting in the Living Room by the fireplace.  Christmas morning had an early start-Seth and I tried to get up early everyday and stay up late every evening while we were home.  I called my parents to wish them a Merry Christmas morning around 7 and I didn't get a Merry Christmas back-I got a "Erika, it is 7 in the morning-what do you want."-O the love :).  Anywho Seth's family are early risers-which is a good thing-so we were all up early on Christmas and were able to enjoy each other. After breakfast-stockings-and presents it turned into a Nerf Gun War targeted at Mrs. Cynthia.

 

Christmas in Union is a Sineath tradition and we were able to see all of my family so that was perfect :).  Friend time came the following few days-we had breakfast with one of my best buds Laurie and her husband-we hung out with Seth's buddies-shot skeets and played some games-and the next day I got to see Sarah and later that evening the newly engaged Beth.  

Seth and I with my parents

                                         

My Cousin Olivia and Bro Eason

The cute Dyches couple

After a great but busy week-Seth and I were ready to head back to our adult lives in Utah and be in our own home :).  Looking forward to visitors and the next time we will be in good ol' South Carolina!

The Cook's :).

Utah fun.

So, long time since I've been to update our lives on here.  Everytime I try I can only get as far as the number of days we have left to go to South Carolina-so I figured that wouldn't be to exciting to some of you :).  

Seth has been a busy bee with completing side projects for professors-preparing and presenting projects for classes-reading-working on his thesis-and getting things ready for next semester.  First semester of Grad school down-3 more to go :).  I've been busy working-doing this domesticated thing-and doing my best to distract Seth while he works on these projects :).

Recent entertainment:

Babysitting:  We offered to babysit for a couple from our church-just so they can go out and enjoy themselves without children all the time and also so Seth and I can get our children fix.  I've already mentioned that a lot of couples our age in Utah have children-so it just makes us (or at least me) think of the idea of having children.  Who they will look like-how they will act (like a Sineath or a Cook/Marsh)-how we will afford them-raise them-etc...So-babysitting essentially helps Seth and I to understand that we may not be quite ready for all that commitment :)-but we enjoy hanging around them at times.  They have a 4 year old and 14 month old-and the 4 year old stuck with me and the 14 month old loved Seth and his beard!  Well that was the case until the younger girl had a poopey diaper and Seth passed her over to me :).

Louisiana style BBQ:  Seth and I along with a few other couples-got invited to a BBQ at a couples home (who are from Louisiana).  We have been to BBQ's before-which are fun but not the BBQ that Seth and I were expecting :).  Since these folks are from the South we definitely had high expectations and they were most definitely MET!  The BBQ was so delicious-tender-yummy-and it was actually BBQ :).  We ate off of Christmas china and it was a lot of fun.  It made me and another lady dream of the day we will have our own place with our own Christmas china!

Utah Weather:  Over Thanksgiving we got a lot of snow and into the negative degree weather.  Over the past few weeks our weather is so moody :).  It went from freezing to being in the upper 30's lower 40's and all our snow melted.  We were warmer than our families in South Carolina.  We are getting back down to the 20's or so...and we got a fresh coat of about 5 inches of snow.  Seth and I both agree we like the snow on the mountains and ground over seeing the grass/dirt-especially with it being so chilly now.  It also gets so foggy here.  Somedays we can't even see the mountains or it will be clear where we are and the next block over it will be so foggy you can't even see!

Hanging out with Friends:  We have met so many wonderful couples/people in Utah and just have enjoyed hanging out with them.  We have been opened up to all sorts of fun games to occupy our time during some of these winter days!  Saturday we just walked around downtown in the snow and enjoyed ourselves with the Stricklands.  We went to there home-had taco soup-watched White Christmas (which I guess is a classic that neither Seth and I had seen before) and was given ski pants that we were soooo pumped about.  It was a great movie and we enjoyed our evening with those guys!  Last night we hung out with our neighbors and just had a blast playing games all evening :).  Seth and I have just become little social butterflys and are making wonderful friends.  BUT we are soooooo sooooo excited about seeing our friends from home and hanging out with them (even for a short time) this coming week!

While hanging out with Gina and Joe on Saturday she asked us what we were looking forward to most about going home-and it was a fun question that I haven't really thought about.  So, Seth and I came home and discussed it and came up with a list:

Excitement of coming to South Carolina List:

1.  I am so ready to just touch my family.  I see them on Skype often but just to touch them and give them huge hugs will be awesome.  To just be beside them only a few feet away will be soooo wonderful instead of 2100 miles away.  Growing up I use to hang/hug on my mother-and at times it may would get annoying and she'd let me know-but I know she is sooo looking forward to this next week when I do all that :).  She probably has missed it soooo and regrets every telling me to stop!  Seth isn't as excited about this one as I am but he is looking forward to hugs he says. 

2.  Seth's was being able to build a fire and sit by it. I am looking forward to this as well.  We will just enjoy being by the fire and drinking a cup of joe-talking with family.

3.  Troupe :)-I have had to 'allow' my parents to adopt my puppy while we are out here.  I will be so glad to see him and annoy him and play with him.  He will NEVER look to me on Skype and it is rather annoying to see him enjoying life and not missing his mother :).  I just hope he remembers me and will sleep with me!

4.  It will be so nice to assist with cooking yummy food and not having to clean it all up.  Especially since our folks have dishwashers :).  We are looking forward to having good Southern meals and sweets and just being spoiled with it.  Also will be fun to not have to wash or iron our own clothes :).

5.  Spending a holiday with families.  Since we missed Thanksgiving with our families it will just be nice to spend Christmas with both of our families!

So-this will be the conclusion to this post.  This time tomorrow we will be on our way to South Carolina ;).  Just praying for safe travels--and good weather conditions--please keep us in your thoughts tomorrow!  

Merry Christmas everyone!

The Cook's :).

Happy Holidays!

Well well well....Hello again :) and Happy Holidays!  Seth and I are getting closer and closer to our going to SouthCarolina date (20 days-for those folks that didn't know)-and we both are getting rather excited!  Seeing parents, siblings, grandparents, cousins-aunts-uncles, and friends--whew we will have our hands full--We are trying to plan everyday to the T to make sure we have time for EVERYONE!  But (of course you all must know) I had to first write of the days left and how excited we both are-Seth is even starting to make comments about seeing our families and how pumped he is! So-moving on to the more important stuff huh!


Thanksgiving-we stuffed our faces and enjoyed ourselves with Gina and Joe.  Gina took on a load of things to cook (while working 12 hr days and going through a blizzard) and made us a DELICIOUS MOIST turkey (her very first one-and we all were so excited and raved about how yummy it was).  We had a fun time celebrating with friends and enjoyed bragging on how we made everything on our own (again Gina more-so than I-but we contributed a little).

Our Cook Bag-That we Transported our Cooked goods In :).

My Favorite Mountains-Fog and Snow Covered-but Still Beautiful.

Gina's Delicious Turkey...

Seth carving off the Leg-Dark Meat.

Our food-Yummy.

 So-Funny Story.  Seth and Joe went to walk some dogs and they were gone for about an hour-and mind you it was -11 degrees Thanksgiving day.  They both have beards and when they walked in they both had icicles in their beards!  We thought it was pretty funny-I wish I would have gotten a picture of it.


Seth and I tried to get out in the snow this past weekend to play-didn't work out as we planned :).  The snow went up to almost my knees, but it was sooo powdery that we couldn't have snow ball fights or build a snowman-so I opted to make snow angels and skip around in the snow.  And of course I had to take pictures!

Crazy amounts of snow.

Demonstrating how deep it is.

Snow Angels..

He LOVES when I take his picture :).

View from our apartment.

The day after all this snow came about-I couldn't get my car out of the parking lot of our apt.  Seth tried to shovel a pathway for my car-but it wouldn't budge and I got stuck.  So-while Seth was pushing and heaving my car into a parking spot-I was luckily able to call a co-worker to come and fetch me :).  How wild is that though-my car getting stuck in the parking lot!  I thought it was hilarious-Seth not so much.  He was so frustrated-that he wasn't 'prepared' and that 'I' was put in a predicament.  Poor fella-he has so much on his plate with school-me :)-and trying to make sure we are taken care of-and we are safe while traveling.

Christmas is on its way!  Whoop Whoop :).  Unfortunately we left ALL our decorations at home-just being forgetful about them while packing-so we were unsure if we would buy any decorations.  Of course we had to.  We bought a small tree--didn't want to buy ornaments or a tree skirt--so with the help of my mother's idea we purchased ribbon for decorating our tree and Christmas fabric as the tree skirt!  It looks simple and quaint and I've thoroughly enjoyed it.  While shopping-Seth said that he REALLY wanted an advent wreath.  He has always had one and wanted us to continue the tradition that his family did-and luckily Seth's mom had sent us a storybook for Advent-that we have been using daily since Advent started :).  Another thing that I've enjoyed.  Today we received our first Christmas stockings from Seth's mom---with our names!!!  Whoop!  

Our cute quaint Christmas tree :).

Our advent wreath..

Our lovely stockings-Seth's Mom made!  Beautiful!

So, Seth and I are prepared for Christmas-We have a Winter Wonderland in Utah!  Although-it may get old quickly-we are enjoying it now!  We are looking forward to coming home and being in the 30's in SC rather than in the 10's in Utah :).  

The Cook's :).