Michael & Amanda and chicklets to call our own: Photogenicity

Photogenicity - (fo-to-jen-is-it-y)- to present one's self as beautiful in any picture taken of him or her due to his or her genetics.

Our entire family has this. Michael, his parents, his siblings, their spouses, his nephew and nieces, his wife, and yes, his baby too. My side of the family has the same problem, picture proof soon to come.

Christmas is just a little spread out this year. We've had quite a few parties, but our biggest ones have quite a few pictures to go with. We celebrated with Michael's family on the weekend of the 17th. During the holidays, mainly Christmas and Thanksgiving, Marriott associates enjoy the opportunity to stay at a participating Marriott hotel for half the associate discount rate. Normally it's $40, which means it's cut down to 20 bucks during these couple months. So we stayed at a hotel close to Cabela's on Friday night. Brenda came too, mainly for the hot tub and pool, but she had fun at Cabela's too. Michael's cousin's wife, Janneke, is a photographer. I really like her taste and think she does an excellent job. So we paid her to take a few pictures of our cute little Ivan and the three of us for some family pictures. Not really Christmas pictures, we're not in to that. We got to take them at BYU in Provo and had a lot of fun with it. Then we went to Burger King. I only mention this because they changed the absolute best thing they had going for them... their fries. They used to be so good, the batter was different than any other place. Now they just plain suck. Boo. Saturday we all met at Chris and Laura's house to take family pictures. One of Michael's aunts, the same one that took our wedding pictures, was there to photograph all of us. We all got to choose what to wear, but the choices were limited to blue jeans and a white, red, or black shirt. We took pictures outside in front of some beautifully trimmed bushes. I have to say that Ivan is wearing the absolute cutest outfit ever. I love it! After all that, we played games and had the family gift exchange. Everybody rotates between who they get presents for each year. I like it; this way we can get something nice for one person rather than feeling obligated to spend a lot of money and buy for everyone. After gifts, we ate and played more games. Michael and I stayed at a hotel again that night. Lately Ivan has been sleeping through the night. I am always so impressed when he does. What a good little boy. But when we get around a lot of people he kinda goes into panic mode. He sleeps and sleeps all day, and is up all night. So Friday and Saturday night I didn't get much sleep. Is it bad that it irritates me when Ivan is wide awake at 3 am and all sorts of smiley and cute? Probably, but I was just so tired. Sunday we hung out some more, went to church, played games and were planning on being home by 10... Well, you know how it goes. We got to playing games and couldn't stop. Michael could, I couldn't. It was just so fun, I couldn't help myself! So we got home around 1. And I had to work at 8 the next morning.