Ward Christmas Party

Today Casey finished part 2 of his national boards exam! GO CASEY! This was the last test/exam he has to study super intense for, we couldn't be more thrilled for this guy. So proud of him and all his hard work!

Well immediately following his test we had plans to drive to Wyoming for interviews and then make our way down to Denver to fly to AZ. Well those darn Wyoming roads are closed due to snow and high winds, HOW ROTTEN! So we are momentarily stuck here in Nebraska, it's s strange feeling not being gone already for break, we'll leave in a couple days to go meet up with family.

We are very excited to be with our families for the Christmas season, until that happens, here are a couple photos of our ward Christmas party a little bit ago. We sure have a great ward and I'm thankful to be in it!

Centerpieces were gingerbread houses by the youth.

We had so many great helpers with our unruly children. This dear man in our ward, Brother Christensen, nearly is ALWAYS holding a sleeping baby during the Sunday School house at church this year. He's always so ready and willing to hold these babies and let them sleep on him, we are so grateful for his willingness to help us constantly!

The Bundy's were HUGE helpers with our kids too, shocker, that family is always amazing at helping with our bunch of kids. So thankful for them inner lives!

5 very talented women played their flutes together and it was pure music to the ears, make me want to go pick up that violin I haven't seen in a decade!

The babies didn't really get that whole santa thing that was going on.

This was as far as Maxson got, we didn't prep him enough ahead of time, he wouldn't even get on his lap for CANDY! Beloved candy! Ha!

Still have a a little Wyoming Thanksgiving and Maxson's birthday to blog about next!!!

bows or boys or both? // twin gender reveal party

with my pregnancy with maxson, we didn't really get to celebrate his announcement with anyone in person and casey wasn't even with me at the doctor when i found out the gender. so for the twins, i wanted to make it special and fun with family and friends involved. we ordered invitations from tinyprints and were obsessed with how they turned out. i saw this invitation on their site and figured it would work just good enough. BUT they had a designer who looked at my invites, saw i was having twins and customized it specially for me at no extra cost, i was beyond wowed with their service! definitely check them out my friends. having these little invites made the occasion just a tad bit more special, which i so loved!

the dessert table.
mustaches and bows a plenty.




the children were so happy when i said the dessert table was now up for grabs, ha.

pre-gender reveal, so nervous and excited!
me at 16 weeks
also like i mentioned, maxson was beyond happy with the amount of cookies he sneaked.

trying to get everyone on for FaceTime.

and here was the long awaited gender reveal!

i really was so nervous but so excited.

top right is finding out there's one boy and, i believe, second row to the bottom on the left is finding out there's a second boy. the picture just to the right of finding out there's a second boy is casey asking me "how did you know" and i at the same time saying "i was right, i knew it!"

i also love seeing  a few of our friends in the background

^^you see our friend katie just over casey's arm? she's the one who made my vision of the balloon popping all come together, she's a gem of a friend and i LOVE that she's in the background of these pictures with such excitement for us, it's seriously so sweet.

here was what our friend set up for us: she put different colors in balloons, and we threw darts at the canvas to pop them, it was so fun and very thrilling

fyi, since it was 2 boys it was blue and green,

2 girls would have been pink and purple,

and 1 of each would have been some combo of a boy color and a girl color

the canvas actually looks so pretty and i'm stoked to put it in the children's room

here's our sweet friend katie. funny story, as she was pinning the balloons to the canvas, one popped ALL OVER her, with a white shirt on, ha. she ran away in a rush and called casey on the phone to tell him we could throw the darts. she did end up covering up with a sweatshirt so she could see all the excitement from far away.

and i loved maxson's paint splattered face.

and thus we see, 2 more mustaches to add

fyi- if you are ever going to do balloon paint-popping for a gender reveal here's some tips katie did. 

1. she put different amounts of water in with each balloon so the consistencies of the running paint would be different on the canvas.

2. she put glitter in some of them

3. she used a funnel to help with the mess of putting the paint in the balloons and then blowing them up

4. there were different sized balloons: think regular sized balloons and water balloon sized balloons.

ps- as i'm writing this post, it's the first time i can see the movement on my stomach of the babies, the boys! so exciting, at just 17 weeks!

a magical shower

this last week i got to help throw a shower for a friend who will be expecting her baby boy any day now!

they are some big harry potter fans at that house,

so a harry potter baby shower was the most brilliant idea.

thought a few of you would enjoy seeing some of the pictures :)

the invite we sent out:
disclaimer: i got this idea from a gal on pinterest and designed up a similar one

we had so much fun throwing this together.
all the food and drinks were brought by other friends which took SOOO much pressure off me to focus on decorations and a clean house.
THANK YOU FRIENDS!
my co-hostess brought all the fun/pretty baskets, tablecloths, and platters for food plus those awesome HP cookies.
and multiple neighbors were constantly bombarded with my texts like do you have a cauldron? do you have the harry potter books? do you have tall candlesticks/holders? do you have a witch's hat? do you have any HP type decorations?
oh AND my wonderful next door neighbor used her silhouette to cut out the harry potter letters and bats, saved me so much time!
and shout out to casey for helping keep my sink clean the day before and day of :)

happy baby time jessie, can't wait to meet stockton!

a baby shower!

my very sweet friend, katie, and next door neighbor was so kind and thoughtful enough to throw me a baby shower before baby boy came.

she herself is just 4 weeks behind me with her 2nd baby girl!

it's been so fun being pregnant together and experiencing all the same stuff.

so many very sweet girls came to the shower and it was so fun.

i'd only been in lincoln a little over 2 months but i truly felt like these were all my real friends who came,

and let me tell you, they are such a fun group of gals.

it was so fun to sit and chat with them all about babies and pregnancy and life.

i just love when we all get together.

a bunch of of the girls helped katie with the food: popcorn because i in fact was ready to pop :)

we had 5 different very yummy kinds that i kept eating and eating and eating.

it's like i was pregnant or something...

there were also three different kinds of the most delicious cake pops.

and little babies on everyone's laps.

and to top it all off, she did the most darling job with the balloon decorations everywhere.

i loved it!

thank you katie for the wonderful shower!
and susan for the pictures!
and everyone else for helping and coming!

a shower

my super sweet SIL, megan, and my mom put together a slightly last minute shower for me.

it was seriously so fun to get to see a bunch of friends.

and they were all of course so surprised to see me with a pregnant belly.

it just felt so special having so many people who i really care about and love in my life here to celebrate with me and my baby.

sadly, there were pretty much no pictures taken with friends :(

here's some of the pictures that my cousin, danielle, took for me.

a few notes:
balloons make a party a party, am i right?
annalee helped me open the sweet gifts.
my aunt handmade a beautiful blanket and sent it all the way.
mini cupcakes are bomb.
a friend made a bahama bucks onesie and bib for me, how awesome?
fruit pizza is just the best.

 

i truly loved seeing all my friends.
that was the best part.
it was so crazy fun to open up all these cute little baby clothes that i got to keep!
mostly i've just looked at the cute stuff but not gotten to take it home so this was so exciting!

thank you to all those who came, you were so sweet!!!!!!

casey's surprise party and giveaway winner

 out of 27 entries, #26 won, which means

our giveaway winner is miss clarissa!

yay, you won!

if you could email kimberwo{at}gmail{dot}com

with your shipping info, J3LL will be sending you your two favorites!!!

thank you so much everyone else for entering!

the other day when i was in the byu bookstore and there was actually a whole section of J3LL watches by the jewelery area!

go check em out next time you're in there!!!

onto to casey's surprise party!
i can't believe it actually worked. 
worked as in it was actually a surprise to him.
it did have a few kinks in the plan that had to be fixed, let's start from the beginning:


i kept telling casey he should maybe go to nickle city with some guys friends in the afternoon on saturday.
it was supposed to be like my little "gift" to him, you know, guys time, an arcade.
after lots of prodding, no men were found to accompany him.
luckily, his good friend brock knew of my plan of trying to get him out of the house for the little partay.
so, he set up a few guys to go to the RB to play basketball at 5.
that'd give me perfect amount of time to get it all ready, 2 1/2 hours, i got that.
at 6 he calls to tell me he's rolled his ankle and he wants to come home.
really? really.
ha, so i tell him i'm still out grocery shopping and he'll need to wait a little while.
i'm actually in the middle of making the batter for the cake!
bah!
so i finish putting the batter in the pans, throw everything i had out in the back room,
including the uncooked cake :)
i'm literally running around the house doing this while laughing thinking the party won't end up being a surprise.


casey then calls to ask how far away from home i am bc he just decided to limp home.
ha, really, casey!!!
i tell him i'll be finished soon, bc he doesn't have keys to get into the house.
i rush out to the car, jump in, drive like a mad woman out of the driveway, and see him about to walk across the sidewalk 3 houses down!!!
i don't turn his way, but instead take a loop around the block,
by the time i "come back from grocery shopping" he's sitting at the door.
woah, that was close.
things i can't believe he didn't notice:
how i came into the house with 1 fake bag of groceries.
a crockpot with tons of meatballs in it sitting on the counter, wow.



so about 6:45 i somehow get him out of the house teling him we'll go get some free birthday stuff.
luckily he came, even though he totally didn't want to.
we went to firehouse subs (so rude, it had to be ON your birthday, his birthday is on sunday, come on, it's utah!!!!)
and del taco- 2 free tacos and a shake.
during this time i had gotten a few texts from people saying we're here, and getting it all set up!
what a relief!
i left a note on the stairs with lots of directions, ha.
we arrived home at 7:30 with a big old surprise at the top of the stairs!
casey had no clue and was very happy.
(i was kinda worried, bc on the way home from del taco, he said "i just want to go home, sit, and watch basketball..." oh jeeze, what had i done!)
the girls did such a great job setting the house up with my decorations through out both rooms and cake and drinks,
the whole she bang!

we played lots of games, as always, and had a great time.
oreo cake which turned out good enough with a sparkler atop that was impossible to blow out, but looked awesome.
 



we kept the rest of the food simple with meatballs, m&m's, carrots, and an oober yummy drink from suzie.
we had the perfect group of friends there:
2 mission/work friends: brock/emily and andy/kylie
2 family friends: scott/megan/tristan and suzie/ryan.

thank you everyone for coming and helping.
it was so fun!
and, again, happy birthday to casey!