Second Half of 2011 In Review

So I am a slacker. A major major slacker. I would like to think I have been spending my time doing more important things than blogging- but who are we kidding? I am just a slacker. So I am going to wrap up 2011 in a "best of" post, concise and to the point of the defining moments of second half of the last year. Maybe this year I can start fresh in 2012 (only one month late). So here goes it goes- wish me luck, and feel free to stop reading at any time.

June: 
Family Vacation to Yosemite National Park in California:

Danny and Owen

The family in front of a really large tree (its late and I can't remember the name of it)

A few quick things about the trip:
-This was the first time our whole family has been together since Danny and I got married (Stephen was on his mission, and everyone lives in different parts of the country). It was so fun to see how everyone interacted!
-Russell wrote a show called "The Taylor Bunch" (the exact script of a Brady Bunch episode) and we all acted it out which was not only an amazing feat but incredibly humorous.

Also in June: I got called as the ward Young Women President and Danny left for his internship in Chile.

July: 
Girls Camp near the "City of Rocks" in Idaho. There are only three Young Women in the ward so we had just as many leaders as girls but we had such a good time. I love that the girls view us not only as leaders but as friends. We made crafts, braided strings into each others hair, made fires, hiked, and of course went "snipe hunting." One night I stayed up late with the girls and played Truth or Dare. We had so much fun, one of the girls made me eat a tablespoon of mustard though and I about lost it!

Hiking at the City of Rocks

Braiding Each others hair

Also in June, Danny was gone all month doing an internship for the LDS Church in Santiago, Chile. He really enjoyed the work he did there and he especially enjoyed the people he worked with. He got to see a bunch of really cool places and things but my favorite part of the whole thing was when he came home on July 30th!

August:
My goal in August was to cram an entire summers worth of activities into one month (since Danny was in school or gone for the rest of the summer). We spent a lot of time visiting family and enjoying being in the same country. We also went to Florida with our good friends Chad, Tiani, Melinda, Tony, and Cam. These are some of the funnest people to be with. We went snorkeling in Key Largo, went to Universal Studios/Harry Potter World (dream come true), and spent a relaxing day on the beach. 

Snorkeling in Key Largo 

Eating at a seafood shack on the beach

Drinking butterbeer at "The Three Broomsticks" in Harry Potter World

Hogwarts

September: 
September meant back to school, and more importantly for Danny, back to soccer! This month was full of getting back into the swing of things with school, work, sports, and church. It was nice be back to normal life.

October: 
Ever since we got married (and when we were engaged) I have wanted to dress up like Lucy and Ricky Ricardo for Halloween because, lets by honest, this is kind of our life (except Danny isn't musical). Unfortunately Danny's regional soccer tournament is always the weekend of Halloween. So this year my friend Karie and I planned a Halloween Party on Monday so I would have an excuse to dress up. 

(we didn't really get a good picture)

November:
This month was full of trials for the Taylor family.
On November 9th my little one-year-old niece, Sadie, was diagnosed with Leukemia. She is the happiest little girl in the world and it was really heart wrenching to see this trial in her life at such a young age. Two days later my sister Julianne delivered a little baby boy, Zachary. He was born born healthy and without too much difficulty, but about 8 hours after he was born he started having trouble breathing and was rushed to another hospital. To make a long story short, his lung collapsed and he came fairly close to not making it. My sister was in one hospital and her newborn son was in the NICU in another.

As I was in Utah waiting every moment to hear news of how my family members were doing many times I felt helpless. I wish I could be there for them, carry the burden, or help in any way I could. (one lives in California, the other in Washington DC)
All I could do was pray that they would be comforted and that Heavenly Father would watch over them. As Thanksgiving came closer I felt like I should take the opportunity of having a few days off of work to help in whatever way I could. So I flew out to Washington DC for a few days to watch Zach's older sister and help drive Julianne to and from the hospital to visit her son. I was so grateful for this opportunity to spend time with my sister who I rarely see, and (hopefully) I helped lighten her load a little. There is nothing like a few trials to really make you grateful for everything that you have. This really made Thanksgiving even more meaningful for me.

Update: Zach was in the hospital for almost a month but has made a full recovery and is doing great! Sadie began chemo therapy right away, she is responding very well and things are looking very good for her.

December:
Always a favorite of mine, this month of December. I love that the snow is still exciting, that school is ending for Danny, and that it is Christmas time. Sadly, this December was a little less cheery than usual because it was foreshadowing by Danny leaving for another internship at the beginning of January. I tried to suck every last morsel out of the time we had together (pretty sure Danny got sick of me) but it sure didn't seem like enough. We spent the month with family and friends, the usual Christmas parties and seeing people we don't usually get to see.

The annual roommate Christmas party

Alright thanks for hanging in there. I will make a valiant effort to do better in 2012

We are Family

A picture says a thousand words so I will let these pictures speak accompanied by four words of my own: I love my family!

The whole crew

The Taylor girls

The "Taylor Bunch"

Fonseca Family

The little ones

My cute parents

One is the Loneliest Number

"Number one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do

One is the loneliest, one is the loneliest,

One is the loneleliest number that you'll ever do

It's just no good anymore since [he] went away"

-Three Dog Night

This song has been running through my head for a week now. Danny got an internship working for the LDS church this summer in Santiago, Chile. Which is AWESOME for him. However, it makes for one lonely wife back in Utah. He has been gone for a week now and has 34 days left (but who's counting?!). So if anyone wants to hang out this summer, you know where to find me :)

Gift of Life and Breath 5k

My sister Julianne's father-in-law passed away from lung cancer a few years ago and his family has started an annual 5k fundraiser in Denver called the Gift of Life and Breath to help support early detection of lung cancer.This year Danny and I along with my brother Stephen decided to drive to Colorado to participate.

The crew after the race. Go "Team Zollinger!"

*I see now why people always thought we were twins.

The 5k was a success- Danny ran it in half the time I did- but I came in 5 minutes under my goal so I felt good about it. It was so great to be able to go up and help support such a great cause that hits so close to home. We also enjoyed spending some quality time with Julianne, Nathan and Addison.

The Ping Pong was Passionate and Powerful

The Addison was agitated and yet...adorable

Thanks for the great weekend Zollinger family!

A homecoming, a wedding, and a bowlathon

Three months in three words: homecoming, wedding, bowlathon. Pretty exciting eh?

My younger brother Stephen came home from his mission in Fresno California on February 9th. It was so exciting! So much has happened since he left two years ago (including me and Danny getting married) so it is so fun to have him back home. It was also really fun to see Russell's reaction. Russell looks up to Stephen so much and has missed him from day one. The week after Stephen left Russell was leaving "Welcome home!" messages in Stephen's room. This is a picture of Russell's face (pretty much all day) he couldn't stop giggling. (sorry its blurry)

When Stephen came down the elevator Russell ran up to him and gave him a big hug and then started crying. It was really sweet.

Another really sweet thing for me that day was getting to introduce Danny to Stephen as my husband. Stephen knew Danny before he went on his mission and has been telling me for years to marry him. So it wasn't really anything to crazy but it was really neat to see how well Danny and Stephen get along. Stephen said to Danny at one point, "I'm really glad you married my sister." That means a lot to me. Also Stephen wanted to go talk to a few of the inactive members in our ward before he was released and Danny went as his companion. Two of my favorite people out tracting together. Awesome.

Second big thing is that my best friend Amanda got married on March 11. It was so great.

I always love going to weddings, such a happy day.

Temples are amazing. It's also always so great to see all my friends that I never get to see anymore.

I love those girls (and their husbands).

Third thing, not really such a big deal, (but still fun) is that Danny and I participated in the Zions bank bowlathon.

The big news is that I beat him in one of our games! I took a picture to document the moment.

Danny and I have only been bowling together on our wedding day so it was fun to go bowling together again. Also, rumor has it that I had the highest women's score. Just goes to show us bank tellers aren't great bowlers.

Navidad y otras actividades

So I feel like I am just going to dump a lot of pictures and random stories on you right here, but a lot has happened during the holidays so I'm going to play catchup. My favorite thing about the holidays is getting to be with friends and family, and especially those who we don't get to see other times of the year.

It all started with the Christmas party with with my roommates from freshman year:

I love getting together with these girls, I really got so lucky with the roommates I had my first year here. We don't get to see each other very often but when we do it is as though no time has passed. We eat, laugh, watch some Gilmore girls, and catch up on the boys (not as exciting now that most of us are married), and laugh some more. These girls are awesome. This year we did a "favorite things" theme where we each gave each other one of our favorite things. So naturally, I gave each of the girls a live goldfish. None of which are still alive.

We also had dinner and played games with our friends Alyssa and Jake. This is not an unusual event but this night we had an epic game of Jenga. Here is documentation:

So the tower is no so huge here but check out Danny's face. We laughed so hard.

This is the tower at its highest point. There was literally not a single block that could be taken out so Danny completely moved the tower to one side.

I consequently lost the game the next turn.

Next up was our Christmas get together with my friends from high school. This is another group of incredible girls. Always a pleasure. And of course the typical normal and crazy face pictures (just for the record I thought BOTH of them were crazy face pictures, my smile is not usually that weird).

And then of course there is the real deal of Christmas. The sad news is that as Danny and I were having our Christmas I went to take a picture and my camera died. My charger is lost somewhere between Logan, Utah and Raleigh, North Carolina. So I didn't get any pictures of our Christmas, or the Fonseca Christmas. But thanks to my sister-in-law and her handy dandy charger I did get a few of the Taylor family Christmas. It was so great to have so much of my family there. Everyone lives so far away so I don't get to see the nieces and nephews very often. We have a blast together. (I guess I didn't get any pictures with Samantha, Collin, and Owen but I have a blast with them too!)

This is one of the shirts I made for all the nephews for Christmas. To give credit where credit is due, the idea came from one of my favorite blogs, I Am Momma Hear Me Roar.

Here is a picture I snapped a few days later before Danny and I took our Christmas tree down. It is the only one that even resembles our little Christmas (sorry I'm always in gross sweats). Feliz Navidad!

High School Dance

You heard me. Danny and I went to the Viewmont high school Christmas dance a few weeks ago, and we (and by we I mean mostly I) had a blast. Russell got asked to go by a girl from school and Danny and I went as their chaperones. Here are a few pictures from the experience:

A few of my favorite things about the experience:

-I decided to "ask" Danny to the dance like all the high schoolers do. I did it all tricky though so I was home pretending ot be asleep when it was all delivered. I just had a bunch of balloons with notes inside of them (one with my name on it) and a sign that said, "Don't burst by bubble, go to the Christmas dance with me." To make a long story short, he thought it was one of our friends playing a joke on us and had no idea it was from me, so he wanted me to pop the balloons. I finally got him to pop the balloons and he was so confused when he saw my name. Needless to say, it didn't go as planned. I was laughing pretty hard though.

-Watching Russell dance. He has no inhibitions and it is awesome. We should all be more like that.

-Russell and his date both voted that I was a better dance than Danny :) Although I gotta admit, Danny has some sweet moves!

-If you want more details and you follow Russells's blog, go here for more: Gafugamugabub.