The Johnson Annual Gingerbread Creation-Trailer Park Style!

Every fall near Christmas time the Johnson family gets together and makes a gingerbread house.  This year we decided to use cardboard instead of the normal gingerbread houses, because the structure has increased in size year after year.  I believe my mother-in-law Karen had to 10x the recipe for last years house.  Sounds like a sweet, fun family tradition right?  WRONG!  Well I should say it is sweet because there is lots of candy involved, and it is fun because of all the twisted things you will find in these pictures...they may be disturbing so please don't read any further if you get squeamish by seeing dead cinnamon Santa Clauses.

This is like the book Where is Waldo? and you can find all the different things happening on the page.  Well do you see the car accident killing innocent candy men, dinosaurs eating cinnamon Santa candies, and the only normal pretty thing on the board my beautiful Christmas tree (it is on the lower right)?

T-Rex eating a cinnamon Santa Clause while...how should I put it...going to the bathroom.

 An army of cinnamon Santa Clauses.

Two toy trucks pulling a Santa apart.

If you are still reading, I met Jarid's whole family for the first time while participating in this family tradition.  He said he wanted to make sure I would be able to accept him and like his family for who they are.  Needless to say, I wasn't scared off! 

  

The Love of my Life!!

I call him "Bear" a lot because he is so protective, and yet so cuddly!  Love it!

(I am sure real bears are not as cuddly but you know what I mean.)

He goes golfing with his buddy and this is what he brings back.  

An Unforgettable Trip!

In February Jarid and I traveled down to AZ for the baby blessing of my newest nephew Daniel Dax Davis!

(This picture was taken by my brother-in-law Dustin who is a great photographer just check out http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fat-Lemon-Media/162286437168264 )

We left in the morning right after Jarid got off work, so I got him a little something so he could sleep better....

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

It was a joke though, and I did actually get him a more "manly" mask!  Driving down to AZ wasn't bad at all, and my Grandma Pickett came with us.  We actually got to stop and see one of my cousins, Brad, that I haven't seen since I was a very little girl!  He is now a firefighter, and he took us on a tour of his station and showed us his truck.  

I was happy to arrive in Mesa though, and I missed my family sooo much it was good to see them!!  We spent a few days in Mesa with Tamara, Dustin, and Jenae.  We went to the Zoo with them, and it was so crazy to see how much the kiddos have grown!  I wish we could be closer to see them more frequently!

Andy wrestling the alligator!

The one request from Jarid on this trip was that we eat at a Russian restaurant, so Jarid looked up a few and most of them had closed down.  He found one in Phoenix so we were off.  After about 45 mins of driving and searching for what seemed like a non-existent restaurant we found it, and it too was closed down! All of the Russian restaurants were shut down...hmmm...health code violations??  We ended up eating Indian food with Tamara, Dustin, and Grandma Pickett-it was her first time eating Indian food. 

 We eventually went down to Safford/Thatcher, AZ and got to hold and cuddle baby Daniel!!  OH HE IS SOOO ADORABLE!  We got to see Rachelle and Darren, and a lot of other family!

The funniest part of our entire trip was our hotel room.  We (Jenae my oldest sister, Jarid, and I ) decided to share a hotel room and split the pay, yet when we walked in there was a major problem-one king size bed.  Jenae quickly decided that I would be sleeping in the middle (they would not switch our rooms).  Needless to say, in the morning we all decided NOT to do that ever again for some reason or another!  I think Jarid was the only one who slept semi-well.  

Everything else went well except the trip home. We started Sunday night and were planning on driving through the night.  However, just outside of Page, Arizona I got the flu and started vomiting.  We stopped in Page for the night, and it was awful.  I had no sleep the entire night because I was violently vomiting every 5-30 minutes, and passing out afterward.  I would try to wake Jarid to help me, but he would just pat me on the back for comfort and go back to sleep.  At one point I asked him to get me some Sprite, so he got up like a faithful husband and found himself in the stairwell unsure why he was there.  The poor guy!  Wait what am I saying POOR ME!  By the morning I was delusional and extremely dehydrated, so Jarid by some miracle got me into the car and took me to the ER.  They gave me a lot of medications and fluids.   I kept going in and out of consciousness, and my loving husband extremely worried wouldn't leave my side!  With two full bags of fluids and no urine out put the nurse said I needed fluids badly.  Finally we checked out, and got home.  Unfortunately, the next 3 days I spent in bed.   

Even though I came back with the flu, the trip was worth it to see my family and celebrate baby Daniel and his lucky parents. Congrats Rachelle and Darren Davis! 

We must be just a little crazy....

One of the things that I loved about Jarid when we were dating was his LOVE for his family especially his nieces and nephews!!  He even took me on a date once to Jump on It with his oldest niece Kaitlyn and Doug.  He went on regular dates with the older kiddos, but now that he is married we went all or nothing!  It was sleep over time, and we had all 6 of our Johnson nieces and nephews over for the fun!

We had Kaitlyn, Doug, Talon, and Alec from Melissa and Jake Johnson &

Jaxon and Abigail from Angel and Jason Jonson  (ages ranging from 8 to 1 yrs old)!  

FUN CRAZY JUMPING TUMBLING FUN!  

We had a big dinner for the kids full of lots of chicken nuggets (dino shaped), homemade french fries, and of course veggies.  Then Uncle Jarid and all the kids built a large fort with Christmas lights and sheets, but we ran out of sheets so the sides suffered a little.  Afterwards we pulled all the mattresses in the living room and set up camp!  The kids all slept on our king size mattress, and Jarid and I got a full sized mattress that was not so soft and nice.  After the mattresses went down there was TONS of jumping and tumbling!

These two squirts were the wildest! Alec and Jaxon are both 2 (Alec is now 3, but 2 at the time), but they loved each other and fuel the mischievousness of the other. 

 After the fort was all built and it was getting late we all bunched up in our places to watch a movie: "Jungle Book 2."  

In the morning we woke up and Doug was missing.  I found him wedged between two other kids stealing their blankets and pillow space, and Jaxon had wiggled his way onto our bed squishing Jarid.  They all slept really well with no interruptions during the night!  THANK HEAVENS!  However, I was dying because the mattress we got was not comfortable at all!  We had a super yummy breakfast with the kids of pancakes and eggs, and then the parents came and got them all.  They were all gone as quick as they came, and yet the mess remained.   I had to work that Saturday so I left the mess and told Jarid I help would clean it when I came home.  TO MY SURPRISE...I came home to a perfectly clean house.  What an amazing husband I have and what an awesome family I married into!  

What a fun night we had!!  

  

It's Pink...like Pepto-Bismol

Ever since we started going to our ward we have told the members where we moved in and their response is, "Oh, the pink house."  I never understood...until we tore out the built in desk in the second bedroom upstairs and found this:

1) Light pink upper walls

AND   2) pattern PINK wall paper on the lower part of the walls with matching pick carpet

We have now discovered what they all meant by the pink house, because from what I have been told the WHOLE house was covered in the pink wall paper, paint, and carpet...one of her grandsons (because it was an older lady who owned the house previously) came in and told his grandma that her house looked like Pepto-Bismol.  I can now see why...

I hate PINK!