Christmas 2013

A couple of weeks before Christmas, we went and got our first tree! It's fun having all these firsts.

Having such a tall husband basically is awesome most the time. He could wrap the rope around the tree on top of Tim without even getting on his tiptoes. The tree man was very impressed.

Here it is all decorated! I sat in the living room with the lights out looking at the tree as much as possible. 

The Schauerhamers have a tradition where every year they get a Christmas ornament. We had all of Trevors' ornaments on our tree from his whole life. I think this is an awesome tradition.

Last year, Lisa got me an ornament. Mine was a castle, Trevor an game controller.

I love that mine is a castle - that is the year that I met my Prince Charming and he swept me away! I'll always remember the castle as the first year we were together for Christmas.

I don't have a picture - but this year for our ornament we got the SL temple! I LOVE it! So we have our first married ornament - the SL temple! I was so excited when I opened it up.

Another big time Schauerhamer tradition is Santa pictures. Craig and Lisa took Santa pictures of themselves every year until they had a baby. Without exception, they have a picture of all their kids (and now grandkids) every year since birth. While Trevor was on his mission, he took a single picture with Santa. Lisa puts every picture up in order, all 30+ of them. It's really cool.

Lisa made me take a Santa picture with Trevor last year, but I refused to be in the family one, in case we didn't work out. So this was my first year in the family one. I don't have them now, so i'll have to post them later.

I did take some pictures with my brother (and Roz hopped in) with my camera. Grandpa had taken Taylor to the airport that morning to fly home, but due to the insane snow storm his flight was delayed twice and then cancelled. So I picked him up from the airport (luckily I had been let off work early due to the snow) and we hung out the whole day. It was basically awesome.

View from the front of our apartment

Snapchat to Bob I accidentally saved on my phone and found later and thought was hilarious. I took the picture before I finished writing "reindeer".

I'm not sure what was going on here.

Night view out of our apartment.

We made Christmas sugar cookies! The lazy man way. But still festive. And they were absolutely amazing.

Our tree with presents!

In my family, Christmas Eve is always when we have our nice family Christmas dinner. In Trevor's family, they go to his Grandparents house on Christmas Eve and have finger foods. William's birthday is also on Christmas Eve, so we had his birthday party on Christmas Eve.

So before going to his Grandparents, we had a nice Christmas dinner. My dad sent a delicious ham, so we had ham, green bean casserole, cheesy potatoes, mashed potatoes and the most amazing stuffing in the world thanks to Sachi's recipe. And of course we also had Saudi Champagne and ate by candle light. It was awesome!

My parents always get us Christmas jammies, but we aren't with my parents, and Trev's mom always does jammies but decided not to this year. So I bought ours. I was way excited about Trev's.

I got him nice flannel bottoms and a "HUMP DAY" t-shirt. He and his co-workers love it.

After dinner we opened jammies, then went to his grandparents.

When we got back from Christmas Eve, Trevor had the idea to put our mattress and sleep next to the tree. It was so fun! 

That night, sadly, I got way sick. A horrible fever. It got so bad Trevor gave me a blessing at 3am. We both finally got to sleep at about 4. Not the best Christmas Eve night ever. I ended up getting a horrible fever again Christmas night, and all the next day. I had been really sick with a persistent UTI for the whole month, and had just gotten new meds. Turns out I was allergic to one of them. In addition to the fevers, I got rashes all over my arms and legs. I'm still getting rashes from it.

In the morning, we opened presents! I got an amazing coat from mom and dad that is supposedly the warmest coat in the world. I LOVE it! It is sooo warm.

Mikail gave me the most amazing sushi plates/chopsticks. I've been wanting chopsticks and a sushi plate for a really long time. We often get takeout sushi, and it's a pain to find something to put the soy sauce in and those wooden chopsticks. 

Trevor gave me new scriptures with my new name! I LOVE them! And what a thoughtful, sweet gift. He wanted to put Deann as well, but Schauerhamer was longer than they allowed by one letter on its own, so no middle name. 

He gave me a beautiful blue wallet, since my current one was falling apart. Like, I couldn't put hardly anything in it because it would fall out. And he chose so well - it's beautiful and I've gotten compliments on it already.

For his grand finale, he went into the bedroom and got an unwrapped gift. He grabbed his ipad and began to read me:

A Heart Is Like A Compass

A heart does not understand boudaries

A heart is like a compass

It only knows what it feels

and points that way

A compass needle knows only to point to true North

A heart only points in a direction it feels True

My heart only points, without shame, to you

The same, no matter where I turn, or what I do

Loving you seems the only thing to do 

by JAMES T. ADAIR

Then he gave me a beautiful silver necklace with a compass pendant. He told me he is my true north, and the compass will always point to him. And when I'm with him, I am at home. It was so cute and romantic.

Then he opened my gift to him.

Brian Regen tickets! 

After opening our gifts, we went to Trevor's parents house, where the whole family was gathering.

Here is Trev with his hump day shirt - and - Lisa got one for Christmas too!

For Williams' first birthday the theme was mustaches.

My dad got Trev a backpack for Christmas, one he asked for, and also this smaller ipad bag. Trev really likes it - but it's a little feminine and small for him. He looked online and it is definitely a female bag. So he is going to try to exchange it for something a little more masculine.

AH! He's so cute!

We came home and played with our gifts, played xbox and watched movies. It was such a fun Christmas! This is the aftermath disaster.

It was really weird not to be at home for Christmas and I missed my family a lot! This is the first year all the siblings haven't slept on my floor on Christmas Eve. But Taylor continued the tradition in my absence.  Trev knew I was sad not to be at home, so he went out of his way to make this the best Christmas, and he did an amazing job. 

Here is to our first married Christmas!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Love,

Brittney