Visit to SLC-Cannon is leaving

My brother Cannon is leaving to serve his mission and he decided to have his farewell the Sunday before he left on Wednesday.  Stu had his national training in Florida from Friday to Monday so he missed the farewell, but Hannah and I were not planning on missing it.  
Hannah and I flew out Friday to SLC.  Flying Southwest blows!  They don't fly direct to SLC so what should be an hour 1/2 flight takes 6+ hours with a layover in Vegas.  We finally arrived and went to dinner with my folks and Cannon.  Saturday I was able to go out to lunch with a dear friend that I didn't get to see when we were home for Thanksgiving and Sunday was the farewell.  I realized I never took any pictures of the farewell.  :(  Cannon had some great support at his farewell and he did a great job speaking.  You can tell he was ready to go and get started on this awesome adventure.  At the open house, one of my parents neighbors brought over a basket of bunnies that Hannah LOVED.  They were about 3 weeks old and she thought they were 'so cute'.

On Monday Stu and my little sister arrived.  It was good to see Stu and of course a delight to see my sister who brought her boyfriend to meet the family.  He had never been this far west and thought the mountains were breathtaking!  Too bad there was an inversion that was hiding them!

Tuesday night Cannon was set apart.  He was official-he even turned over his phone and everything :)

 Cannon with his 2 big sisters

The baby will be about Hannah's current age when Cannon gets back.  When he comes back we will recreate this picture with him holding the baby

Wednesday arrived and Cannon was suppose to report at 1PM to the MTC.  My brother Cole was out of town till Tuesday night so we schedule a family picture session for 9AM Wednesday morning.  That is how we roll, last minute!  The crappy thing was that there was a 70% chance of rain.  This FREAKED me out because we had no indoor back up plan.  Thankfully it started raining right when we finished (the final family pictures to come at a later date) but it was SOOO cold.  Hannah was shivering and I mean big time while we took pictures.
Here are some pictures of the camera that took the pictures from family picture day:

 The Nicholls siblings

Reeder family with a VERY cold Hannah

Because of our flight we could not go to the MTC.  We said our goodbyes to Cannon and headed to the airport.  But I did get this one sent to me:

My 2 brothers

Cannon will be a great missionary.  I hope he doesn't freeze in Michigan!  He will be greatly missed but we are so excited for all the love he will be able to shine down on Michigan.

Here are some picture of the sun setting as we were leaving Las Vegas:

Side note:  For Stu's national training meeting, he wanted to shave his beard.  He wanted to get it professionally done at a barber shop.  So the Friday he left he got a shave and a hair cut.  I had him send me a picture:

 Before

After

I told him that he looked naked.  He grew out the beard for "no shave November".  He said the shave was AMAZING and would do it again and again.  The hair cute looks nice too.  He said the strange thing was that the barber also clips your eyebrows.  Stu liked this, but thought it was strange.  Having never been to a barber (obviously) I thought it was strange.  But he looked amazing!

Prego Picture

The belly is growing and starting to pop.  I can feel our little one moving.  Hopefully in a few more weeks Stu can feel the little one move.  

Stu and I have both had a dream that we are having a boy.  We are not finding out so I have started to call the baby "him" instead of "them".  Stu still calls the baby "it" which drives me INSANE, but this is his way of protesting because we are not finding out.  Guess I can cut him some slack.

Its windy here

We have not had any moisture since the beginning of December.  We do get wind in Reno, which helps to clean out the air here.  No inversion!  Or a very very small one.  
Today the wind really started to blow.  We have a wood swing that my grandparents owned that we inherited.  We covered it up for the winter so that the moisture would not damage it.  *its been in St. George under an overhand so its not weatherized*
Stu and I were going about our morning business.  Stu opens the blinds and says "whoah"  I say "what"?? He tells me to look outside.  The wind has blown the wooden swing from the side of our house about 10-15 feet.  Here is the picture of what we found:

If you are asking yourself  "is it upside down" the answer would be YES.  Thankfully nothing was damaged

Crazy weather we have here in Reno!

7 Year Itch???

Stu and I celebrated our 7 year anniversary today.  It was my turn to be in charge of the date.  I really wanted to go out to dinner without miss Hannah.  So I contacted Hannah's nursery leader at church to see if her 13 yr old daughter would be willing to babysit.  Janet (the mom) said that Julia (the 13 yr old) was going to be at her dads, but she would be willing to come over and watch her.  She even said to take our time so we got to go out for dinner AND a movie. We felt like we had been handed a winning lottery ticket.  I have been craving a Benihana type dinner so I found one at one of the casinos.  It was super fun to have a night out.  And then we saw "Saving Mr. Banks".  Super cute!
 Stu and I give each other the TRADITIONAL gifts for wedding anniversaries.  This year was copper or wool.  I got Stu a copper fire pit for outside and Stu got me 2 dozen roses (just because) made me breakfast and got me a wool cap with diamond earrings inside!!  I had asked for something 'sparkly' for Christmas and he surprised me with them for our anniversary!

 Hannah is having dad smell one of mom's anniversary flowers

My beautiful diamond earrings

Out on our date

Its been said that after 7 years one gets the 7 year itch.  Not sure what they could be taking about.  I get my itch scratched everyday by my marvelous husband. :)  It is amazing, simply amazing that 7 years have gone by.  Some days it does seem like we have been together FOREVER, but most times it seems like we just met and started to date.  I love this man so much and am so thankful by all he does for me and our family!  7 year itch..BLA  Here is to many many many more years to come.  I love you sweetie!!

Happy New Year

Stu had the day off so we decided to head to Sacramento to visit Ikea.  I do miss having an Ikea so close when we lived in Utah, but since we had a small accident and our rental had to be returned for another (this time a truck) we figured...better take advance of a truck and get the furniture we needed from Ikea. 
Sacramento is about 2 hours away from Reno.  So we left early, got lunch at Chick-Fil-A (baby wanted that one ;) ) and then Ikea.  We have been talking about turning our "formal" dining room into a play room for Hannah and I was looking for a little table and chairs for it.  We also wanted to get her a 'big girl' bed.  Overall, we left with more than we anticipated (isn't always like that?) and enjoyed our first day of the New Year.

The family at Ikea

 Hannah's new play room

 She loves having someplace to color (better than the floor)