Marsh Madness: January 2015

On December 29th we had to put down my family's dog, Beau. Man oh man - that was truly one of the worst days of my life. Our poor pup was declining fast and his quality of life had dwindled to almost nothing. Our once spry, energetic dog slept most of the day, could no longer see or really hear. He also only had a couple of teeth left (he had a mouth infection and lost a bunch), and the poor thing was having to wear diapers because he really didn't know what the heck was going on. It was obvious that he was in pain and no longer happy. As much as it broke our hearts to think of life without him, it gave us relief to know he would no longer be in pain and would be much happier.

I am not much of a dog person, but I saw Beau bring so much happiness to our family and comfort to my little brother and sister when they were younger. Beau always knew when someone was sad or sick and would sit close to them, quietly keeping them company. He was so much fun and loved being outside. Beau was a part of our family for 13.5 years! I was in 5th grade when we got him. My little sister was 3 years old - she basically didn't know life without him!

We all went together to say our goodbyes to him and be with him as he died, peacefully in the vet's office. Afterwards we brought him home and buried him in a special spot in our backyard. After that, we read a couple books about "animal heaven" - which by the way, I totally believe in it! Then my dad put together a little slide show of pictures and videos we had of Beau. I love that my dad took the time to put it together: click here to watch it. If not - here are just a few pics of our pup.

This may all seem a little over the top and cheesy, but I really am grateful for Beau and the happiness that man's best friend brought to our family. He was truly a blessing and will be greatly missed. We love our little Beau dog!

Believe it or not, this Christmas was my first one in AZ. It was delightful to say the least. The weather was so perfect! I had family in Utah ask me how the weather was and I didn't even know how to describe it because it wasn't hot or cold. It was just so perfect. We did a lot of fun things and it was great just to spend time with our all of our Marsh family.
Carter had lots of fun people watching and chasing the dogs around the house. He also loved following his one and only cousin, Elizabeth.

like I said, loving the exploring

Carter had an obvious preference for Papa
- even to his mom -
I had to learn to be okay with it for the week

if we ever make buko buck one day... we WILL have one of these
SO MUCH FUN!!!

hottie alert - dad with a diaper bag, shopping for knives

Christmas Sunday

Tubby Time!

Our annual Gingerbread house project. We totally rocked it this year! You are lucky enough to get five of the hundred pictures we took of our work - we were so proud.

Carter and Elizabeth also had the HILARIOUS opportunity to meet Santa for the first time. It was quite comical. Carter was quite content and curious once he was put on Santa's lap. He was quietly checking out his beard and listening to him talk. Then sweet Lizzie was placed next to Carter on Santa's lap and immediately her Stranger Danger kicked in. Carter was alarmed and possibly thought, this must be a time to cry... so he did :)

waiting in line for santa!

the candy cane made everything better

Christmas Eve we made a delicious dinner and ate as a family, with Aunt Julie and cousins Max and Reece. After dinner we headed out to see the Christmas lights off Cherry Street. It was fun to see all the fun lights and go outside without freezing our buns off!

Aunt Mindy

he loves his aunties

We ended our Christmas Eve with opening our Christmas Jammies and having our own kind of pajama parade. These were the BEST Christmas jammies I think we have ever received. We were so shocked, we could not stop laughing.

I think Brad's won... and he played the part well :)

Truly the BEST!!!

And we can't forget about these cuties in their truly adorable jammies:

Christmas Day was great. We started it earlier and differently than we usually do. We had the opportunity to join an amazing group of people and helped serve breakfast to the homeless under an overpass in Phoenix. There were a lot of friendly people there and it was humbling to be able to talk to them and work with such great people. As we left to head home that morning, I felt guilty just thinking about our Christmas presents. It was a fun experience and we hope to be able to do it again. Rob was nice enough to stay home and take care of the babies for us. We were so ready to see them when we got home.

Christmas morning was fun, opening stockings and exchanging gifts. Carter was ready for his first nap right when we got home, so we had to wait to watch him open his presents.

look how fun all of our stockings are hung up together

nap time snuggles in our jammies

We enjoyed a yummy breakfast of orange french toast then snacked on all of our yummy left over foods all day. We lounged, enjoyed some of our new gifts and watching movies.

That night we went to see the Mesa temple lights. It was another beautiful night and we ran into quite a few people we knew.