Girls Night

For a long time I have wanted to do a girls night with our nieces that live here in Boise. They have asked me to do if for a long time too. They even had the whole night planned. They wanted to make caramel popcorn, watch a movie, paint their fingernails and color. We finally had our night scheduled for Friday, January 17th. We picked up Kaitlin, Kaeli and Ryann and brought them home. The whole way home all they could talk about was how they wanted to dress Vaughn up, do Vaughn's make up, and put Vaughn in a dress! He wasn't too happy about their plans though. 

We got home and they wanted to take a bubble bath (they had just come from swimming at the YMCA). While they took their bath, Vaughn cooked a couple pizzas. After bathing and dinner, I made the caramel popcorn while they colored. I had found some little Hello Kitty coloring/sticker kits that the girls loved. 

Then we all settled in to watch Tangled and eat popcorn. I just couldn't resist giving the girls a pair of sparkly, hot pink, clip on earrings to put on Vaughn. They all tackled him and put the earrings on him!

I just love the looks on all their faces and especially Vaughn's. :)

After the movie, we all went to bed. Poor Ryann woke up in the night with an ear ache. We didn't even have any children's medicine. We felt a little helpless. Vaughn had a bunch of doTerra oils so we looked up what to do with those. We used a little of the melaleuca oil and lavender oil around her ear along with a hot, wet wash cloth. It seemed to help enough that she was able to go back to sleep for the rest of the night. We found out later that the poor thing actually had a double ear infection! 

In the morning we made crepes for breakfast. We really had such a fun time with the girls. They are all so sweet and cute. We missed Lydia and Addie though! 

Coach Ellsworth

My friend and co-worker, Stephanie and her daughter Amiya mentioned to us that her Y-ball team didn't have a basketball coach yet. If they didn't find one, they'd divide all the girls up onto other teams and they would get less playing time. I was so proud of my husband when he volunteered to coach them! We started practices a week later than all the other teams and we have a few girls that haven't really played. He has 7, 10 year old girls! The practices are Mondays and Wednesdays from 6:00-7:00.  

They voted for their team name, 

The Magical Unicorns that will eat you alive!

We were a little surprised at the violent nature of the name, but they were excited about it!

Vaughn's eye surgery

In November we decided to look into LASIK surgery for Vaughn. We went to a couple different places for quotes and ended up scheduling surgery for December. The day arrived and Vaughn went in for surgery;  they tried and tried to do the surgery and just couldn't do it. Apparently the conjunctiva in his eye is too loose and the laser uses suction to get a good slice. The doctor told us that in 14 years of doing this surgery, he'd NEVER seen this before! Leave it to Vaughn to be the unique patient. They decided to give him a few days to see if it would tighten back up. So on January 8th, Vaughn returned for surgery. They had the same problem in the right eye and ended up having to do a different surgery called PRK. The end result will be the same but the recovery time is much longer and there will be more pain. They were able to do the LASIK surgery in the left eye though. He as in quite a bit of pain in the PRK eye. They gave us 2 pages of instructions, one for each eye! There were different drops that had to be put in each eye every 4 hours! We ended up making him a "patch" for the PRK eye because it was hurting!

When we originally scheduled the surgery Vaughn had told me that he was excited to be able to wear sunglasses. He had never really been able to because he needed his regular glasses. When I found out that Morgan had Vaughn's name for Christmas, I asked him to find Vaughn some Aviator sunglasses. He found them and they look so good on him!

Downton Abbey Premiere

Lynsey told me a few weeks ago that there was a special season premiere of Downton Abbey at the Village theater, a week before it was even on TV. Of course, we had to get tickets (it included popcorn which is why we all have huge bags of it!). We were so amazed by the people who came! They were in full costume! Huge hats and dresses with amazing jewelry. The theater had actors that were helping too. We only got to see the first hour of the new season, but it was a lot of fun and totally worth it! 

Looking forward to a great season of Downton Abbey!

2013 A Year in Review

1. Brooke and I decided to through a party for New Year's Eve. We invited everyone we knew to our house for French Toast with caramel syrup at midnight! We had 70 people show up until 2 in the morning. Jared and Kelly also brought fire works and sparkling cider. So at midnight we toasted the new year, set off some fireworks and ate French Toast! This is also the first time that I invited Vaughn to anything! It was after this party that we started getting to know each other better!

2. Earlier in the year, I had bought a Groupon for sleigh ride. So for New Year's Day, our family went up to Garden Valley for a sleigh ride. We had a great time in the sleigh and then had hot chocolate afterwards.

3. Tinkerbell Half Marathon in Disneyland! Me, Brooke, Merillee and Kim all went to California together and spent a few days in the park and then the last morning there, we "ran" the Tinkerbell Half marathon. It was fun to run through Disneyland and the people watching was great! So many costumes.

4. Valentine's Day. Me, Andrea and Brooke all hung out at home and made our favorite cookies. It was this night that Vaughn texted me to see if my sister and I had gotten anything for Valentines day. When I said no, he told me that he should just come over and make us a Valentine's day cake... Then, a few minutes later there was a knock at the door and there was Vaughn with a bag of Valentine's day candy.  We all sat and talked for a while and got to know him better but we didn't know if he was there for me or Brooke (he didn't either)! It was the next week (February 22nd) that we had our first date!

5. St Patrick's Day. This is actually the first picture of Vaughn and I together. We were at a linger longer in our Singles ward. We had gone out several times at this point.

6.  This picture was taken in the cab of a tractor. We had many dates out in Adrian in some kind of tractor. We had a lot of fun together riding around. 

7. Our first corn crop!

8. Andrea and I took a weekend trip to Sun Valley. We enjoyed staying at a hotel, watching General Conference, eating out and just relaxing. I also did Andrea's hair, we wanted to see how big we could make it! This picture is of our big hair. We had a great weekend even though I'm sure Andrea was tired of hearing about me missing Vaughn (he was at Military drill that weekend).

9. Mother's Day. Our family tradition has been for Me, Mom, Brooke, and Gma to go get manicures and pedicures for Mother's day. This year, I also invited Vaughn's mom and sister Mary Jane to come too. Gaylene had never had a manicure and I think she became hooked! It was also fun to have a chance for our moms to get to know each other a little better. 

10. June 3, 2013, we got ENGAGED!!!! It was a Monday night after work. Vaughn invited me to Adrian to go to the property for a dutch oven dinner and bonfire. When I got there the kids came to tell me that they were coming with us. We all went to Vaughn's property where they built a bonfire. Then Vaughn called me over to the creek to try panning for gold. Well, we found gold alright! A gold engagement ring! Vaughn proposed, I said yes and the rest is history! I later chose the ring in the picture. The big diamond was a gift from Gma Velma and we picked the new setting. It is beautiful!

11. Wedding dress shopping! My mom came shopping with me and we found it at the first store!

I loved my amazing dress!

12. Steele Family reunion. We went to Moscow where Vaughn's aunt and uncle hosted the family reunion. I met soooo many Steele's! The family is huge and everyone was great. It was a lot of fun getting to know the family better and it was nice meeting them all as Vaughn's fiance! The worst part of the reunion was that we had borrowed my dad's four wheeler and wrecked it on the first day we were there! It was totaled. Luckily the insurance paid to fix it and it is better than new.

13. Vaughn's sister Susie is a great photographer and she took all of our engagement and wedding photos. We had a fun evening driving around Adrian looking for great photo ops. 

14. As a wedding gift, my boss Dr Bauter, placed new crowns on Vaughn's front teeth. They had been knocked out in basketball many years before and were pretty dark. It was an amazing gift and his teeth look fantastic now! Thanks Dr Bauter and Ashlee!

15. Brooke, Stephanie, Ellie, and Karyl Leavitt all threw me the most amazing bridal shower. It was in Karyl's back yard and they all brought food and planned some games. I had so many people come to support me. I couldn't believe the love and generosity they all showed me. 

16. Andrea gave me a fantastic Bachelorette party! I couldn't believe all that she did for me. We all dressed up and met at her house. The theme was Pretty Little Liars and through the night we had creepy messages from A. A beautiful limo picked us up for dinner at Olive Garden. Such a fun night!

17. August 31, 2013. Wedding Day! We were married in the Boise LDS Temple at 10:30 in the morning and then had a reception in Adrian that evening. It was an amazing day! I am so blessed to be married to the man of my dream and my best friend!

18. Vaughn had to order his dress blue uniform for the military. He surprised me at work all dressed up with the most beautiful bouquet! Such a handsome hubby I have.

19. We try to do some nice dates when we can. For this one, Vaughn surprised me with VIP tickets at the new Village theater for the new Hunger Games movie. 

20. Wine and Dine Half Marathon in Disneyworld! In order to complete the Coast to Coast challenge, Brooke and Merillee and I all signed up for one more half marathon. This one was at 10:00 at night and for me it was painful! I wasn't trained for it so Brooke and I walked the whole thing together! It was great people watching, but 13 miles is  looooong walk!

21. After Thanksgiving, Vaughn's parents took the whole family up to Horseshoe bend for great train ride. Santa comes to greet all the children and the train takes you to Santa's village. In the village, they give you a carton of milk and a carrot on a string to hang on trees for Santa's reindeer. The kids loved it.

22. Family Photo. Vaughn's whole family was here for Thanksgiving and we took a family picture. It was cool to see the WHOLE family together. 

2013 was an amazing year! We started dating, got engaged and married. It was so nice to have the holidays to get to know each other's families better. We are looking forward to another great year.