Christmas Eve

This was my first Christmas away from family. It was a little hard and I really missed some of the traditions my family does like singing around the piano, hearing my dad read the Christmas story, eating soup and scones and all of the other things we do every year. Not to mention I really missed the snow. This year we spent Christmas in warm Hawaii with our little family and Grandma Dona. I made a wicked good prime rib (thanks dad) and we watched Santa Claus 3. After watching the movie Lance and I set up Christmas for Bella and then went to bed. Christmas morning was fun, seeing Bella's face light up when she saw the Christmas tree with all of her presents was great. I didn't think she'd get so excited but she was thrilled! It's been a day of much relaxing and lots of movie watching and eating treats. Overall it's been a good Christmas. I look forward to being with my big family next year :)

Christmas

Ricks Kainalu Ford

Saturday was an eventful day... Here at BYUH they only do the cap and gown/walk thing in the months of December and June so since Lance will be officially graduating in April he chose to walk now. So Saturday Lance, you could say, semi graduated. It was a fun day, but a little stressful and tiring. We got through the graduation and took a bunch of pictures. We then went home and washed the car, drove into town to drop off some of Lance's friends at the airport, came home and on the way home I was talking on the phone with my mother-in-law and told her that my water was going to break at 2am... we got home from the airport, I cleaned the whole house and set up a Christmas tree. (my parents were flying in on Sunday afternoon hence the late night cleaning) I was POOPED by the end of the day. I went to sleep around 11:00pm and low and behold I was sound asleep and I woke up in a pool of water at 2:03 am. My water broke!!! Lance was sitting right next to me watching a movie on the laptop and I sat up and said "Lance, hurry grab me a towel" He jumped up faster than I have ever seen someone jump out of bed. We got to the hospital around 4am when my contractions started to really become painful. They checked me and I was dilated 5 centimeters. It was official I was in labor. My labor was pretty short compared to Bella. From start to finish it was about 7 hours and I was able to have a natural birth, no c-section!! At 11:08am with only 45 minutes of pushing little Ricks Kainalu Ford was born, weighing 8lbs4oz same exact weight as Bella. Twinners! Bella adores him and won't stop giving him kisses. We are both healthy as can be and are home and excited to see how life is with two kids...

...graduation

Elder Ballard spoke at graduation and Lance was lucky enough to get a picture with him and the president of BYU Hawaii and his wife afterwards. Pretty neat... and isn't he such a good looking graduate?

Billabong Pipeline Masters

I just now got off the phone with my mom and she said it's snowing in Utah... It's hard for me to imagine snow and cold. Lance, Bella and I just got back from Pipeline Beach where a major surf competition is happening. It was so cool to watch. The waves weren't as big as I was hoping but it was a beautiful day with the sun shining. I think my belly got a little tan :) PS I took these belly shots especially for you Jane, I know I know I'm HUGE! 4 days to go and yes I'm counting! We still don't have a name picked out for the little guy so I'm a little nervous, but hopefully we'll come up with one in the next few days. All of you in the winterwonderland enjoy it! And we'll enjoy some more surfing and sun here in Hawaii!

Bella and her cousin Tylan

Bella had so much fun while her cousins from Nauvoo were visiting here in Hawaii. My sister Jessica has more pictures that she will send to me and when she does I'll post them, but for now here is Bella's little cousin Tylan. She loved playing with him. In fact I've never seen her play so good with another baby.

I am a blog slacker...

Sorry I promise to be better. This is a picture of Bella at her friends birthday party. She loved the blow up slide... We just had my sister and her family here visiting for a week it was lots of fun. I'll post pictures soon... Mele Kalikimaka!