{texas}

When my mom had the brilliant idea for me to come home to Texas when my sister Ali would get home from her mission to Peru, I jumped on the chance! It was hard leaving Travis and he was so nice to be a good sport about all of this! We decided to surprise Ali and not tell her we were coming. We all put our heads together and came up with a great plan. We changed my flight to the day she flew in, but they happened to be flights to different airports in Houston. Ali's flight got in 2 hours before mine. So once they got her luggage, they headed to get some lunch. Right when they were finishing up my plane landed! It was perfect timing. She had no clue where they were driving, and my brother Jared suddenly said he "needed to go the bathroom" and they just so happened to be pulling up the airport where I was and dad told him to just run in there to go. Well, me and Jake came out with him and Ali just screamed! She is just the cutest and I love her spanish accent. It was so good to be with her, my parents, and 2 little brothers! Jake sure was spoiled.

The plane ride. Woof! We survived. It was exhausting to say the least with a mobile baby who is super busy and doesn't like to sit still! I was constantly trying to entertain, but overall it went fairly smooth. Our flights luckily were pretty empty so we had plenty of space!

Jake meeting Aunt Alison for the first time!

He found his favorite toy even at grandma's house.

He really liked grandma's poppyseed chicken.

Grandma had tons of fun new toys for Jake! He was in heaven.

We got to see my youngest brother Dallin play basketball! My siblings are just getting too grown up.

We had fun seeing my good friend Lisa and her cute kiddos! 

Jake always goes straight for the electronics; a few minutes after this picture, he made his way over to the keyboard and managed to press print on something and we found it printing in the other room!

Jared is sounding so good on the guitar! Jake had never seen one before and thought it was pretty cool.

Jake opened up lots of fun birthday presents!

We ran a 5K!! Dad informed me of this just a few weeks beforehand in November, so I decided I should start running a bit.  It was good motivation to have something to work towards, since I'm not good at the exercise category of life these days.

Fun with the uncles! They taught Jake how to give a high-five.

On our last night in Texas we went to Santa's Wonderland. I don't even think I can describe it with words. Just tons and tons of lights and displays and you drive through in your car to see it all! It is amazing. Jake sat in the front with us and was absolutely mesmerized. 

Always good to have some mom time. She is the best.

We both got hair trimmed together and did all sorts of fun things being "companions" for a few days while the boys were at school.

The plane ride home was harder then the first since Jake woke up early and then wouldn't nap on the plane. But we made it and it was so good to see Travis!