We were so excited for her to retire not only for the benefits to her health but also so that she could begin to enjoy doing the things she loves.   All of us wanted to help celebrate the big event so we went to dinner and then had everyone over for games and a good time.

 Dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory… One of Charlotte’s Favorites!

Did you know that the Old Spaghetti Factory now has gluten free pasta?  Pretty cool!

It’s finally here…Peace Out Corporate America!

The “cake”… it was really a Christmas box with Happy Retirement candles poked down in it.  The best part about a box cake is that you can relight the candles as many times as you want…

yea we did that!

Now that’s some good volume!

The Babes capturing Christmas Eve #2 as a married couple.

Grandma Evans discovering the iPhone camera for the first time.

This picture says it all…  Where is it?!  It’s inside the phone?!

Aside from Grandma’s sheer amazement of the phone, other things this picture captures is how she still wears makeup and gets all dressed up.  I don’t think I have ever seen her (not even when we are camping at Bear Lake) without her eye brow makeup, lip stick on, and her hair done.   When I am her age I want to still be doing my makeup too!  I love this Grandma!

Lynn Gray, Grandma’s husband taking a nap in the chair at the party.  Getting old has got to be the best!

You’re tired and need a nap, no problem, you now have the magical ability to sleep anytime – anywhere and with any amount of chaos going on around you!

We didn’t have tons of pictures from the party this year, but Jason did take this cool panoramic picture, with his iPhone which shows everyone just hanging out having a good Christmas Eve together.

After the party was over, Jason and I and Tyson and Aimee all went over to Charlotte’s house to have a sleep over!  We spent the night playing the game SORRY which I don’t recommend.  Who knew that game could get so intense?!  I swear every time you’re about to win someone sends you home and says…. SORRY!  Which you know they’re not…. HAHA!  Good times!  Eventually we all went to bed and woke up the next morning to the smell of Charlotte’s famous Christmas casserole.  Ahhh, life is good.  Merry Christmas!

I love how Wyatt and Rebecca met.  They have both been attending BYU, Wyatt is majoring in Mechanical Engineering and Rebecca is majoring in Exercise Science with a minor in Business Management (she wants to go into Occupational Therapy), but the best part is that they didn’t meet at school, or in their singles ward, and they weren’t set up by roommates or college friends.  They were setup by Wyatt’s GRANDMA, Bonnie Marshall.  Do you love this story?!  When does that ever work out?  Bonnie knew Rebecca when she was just a little girl and her family lived in her same ward.  When Rebecca was little they moved away to California where her parents still live.  Rebecca grow up and came back to Utah to attend BYU.  When Bonnie received Rebecca’s families annual Christmas card saying that she was attending BYU she was thrilled!  She knew that she had to set Wyatt up with Rebecca.  Their first date was at Wyatt’s Grandma’s house … and the rest is history!

We love these two!

 The Happy Couple coming out of the Salt Lake Temple.

 Jason, Wyatt, Rebecca, Me

Malcolm, Holland, Rebecca, Wyatt, Laura

Here I am standing in front of the Salt Lake doors, just moments before my Marilyn Monroe moment…

You gotta love short skirts and windy days!

This year was our first ever classic Christmas Card to send around to our family and friends.  It was a little tricky to take photos that didn’t look like they were our second engagement photos.  I felt like we needed to barrow someones dog or fish or something to add to our photo.  Oh well, I think our  photographer did a great job in positioning us  in a way that didn’t look like it was round two of engagements.  She was so nice and we think she did a great job!   If you want to check-out her blog, her link is below.

Here are just a few snap shots from our photo shoot.

http://www.kalipoulsen.com/

http://www.kalipoulsen.com/

http://www.kalipoulsen.com/

http://www.kalipoulsen.com/

Jason and I have been making gingerbread houses together every year since the beginning of our relationship (almost 4 years now) and it has turned into quite a little tradition for us.  Typically we make houses with Jason’s family, however this year we ended up doing it with my siblings and their families.  I always love having my family over because of the sheer entertainment and chaos that it provides!  I often times find myself stepping back from whatever activity that is going on, just so I can listen to the sheer volume of noise that is roaring through our house.  It gets SO LOUD that I find myself sitting and laughing over the amount of noise in the house.  I find it hilarious!

When everyone comes over it is seven adults and eight kids… and all in our cute little house.  We basically are shoulder-to-shoulder and not many of us have quite voices.  But that is what I love about it; and that’s how I think it should be around the holidays.  It sure does create lots of fun memories… and I am a big fan of that!

Michael and Mishell teamed up and built a sweet mansion of gingerbread amazingness!

However to much of their disappointment the roof caved in due to the amount of frosting and sheer weight of the candy placed upon its frail fame.  ONE DOWN!

Shane and Robbie teamed up and made a “hut” looking house which also did not survive!

TWO DOWN!

Lauren and Kristen built there own houses!

Although they look strong, Kristen’s was also falling apart not because she didn’t do a good job building it, but because all her candy was missing!  Haha!  I love that girl!

THREE DOWN!

Kaylynn teamed up with her mom and build such a cute little house, however it also did not survive!

FOUR DOWN!

Nicole was so proud of her house, however by walking around hers fell to pieces!  FIVE DOWN!

Jason built the “Twin Towers” in memory of us dating in New York, however those came crashing down by the hand of Nicole!  SIX DOWN!

I built of flat roofed house thinking I would be safe, however the sides of my house clasped in, thus my whole house fell apart!  SEVEN DOWN!

Donovan’s house didn’t even survive being built!  Ha!  You can see in front of him his house is in shambles!  EIGHT DOWN!

Jeffery did SO GOOD and his house lasted quite awhile, that is until he put his roof on and it was ALL down hill from there!  NINE DOWN!

Lauren and Shannon!  Their house was the ONLY one standing at the end of the night!  This house was perfect!  (kind of like the two of them… we love ‘em.)

GOOD JOBS GUYS!  You redeemed the whole activity and made us so proud!

Although the gingerbread building was fun and we all consumed an insane amount of candy, popcorn, and cinnamon rolls the best part of the night was the Christmas Chimes.  A few years ago we received them as a gift and have LOVED getting them out to make our own Christmas music.  I think the reason why we love it so much is because the kids have so much fun, the parents all participate, and it really brings us together.  After the chimes we read a Christmas story and bear truth of our Savior, his birth, and the love he has for all of us.  Although our activities change each year, the message of our night does not.  It really is special time and it’s one I look forward to each year.

Hurray for new traditions!  Here’s a cute video of everyone in action with their chimes!

<<insert chime video>>

I put together this video to recap mine and Jason’s wonderful, exciting, amazing, delightful first year together!  We have had so much fun and being married has been the best ever!  We thought you would like to see some of the great memories we’ve had, so please enjoy the little video below.

First year down, 350 million years and then some to go!  Bring it on, Eternity!

After flying for 16+ hours from London back home to SLC we landed, went home for 1 hour got ready and headed off to to Candice’s surprise birthday party!  Here amazing husband pulled off the biggest surprise party ever!  We all met up Provo canyon for a tinfoil dinners and dutch oven peach cobbler.   Not only that, Mike also make a Gluten Free cobbler just for Jason!  Such a fun party.  Happy Birthday Candice, we are so glad you were born and that we are such great friends!

The babes and Candice… she’s a babe too!

What a huge group!  Lots of people love this girl with good reason!

Going to London was a blast and being there with Jas was even more fun!

Taking the Euro train to get to London was a awesome.  The country side of Paris is gorgeous, mostly farm land, but so pretty.  Of course part of the ride included going through the Channel Tunnel which goes under the ocean for about 30 miles to make it across to the other side.  I did get a little nervous as we approached the shoreline, as it turns out I had nothing to be worried about.   Did you know that the English Channel is one of the  7 wonders of the world?

Once we arrived we headed right out to see the sights.  Our first stop was Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament.   I think the architecture of Big Ben and the Houses are so cool, so old and detailed, and shockingly close to many of the types of structures we saw in Paris.  What I didn’t realize until this trip, was many of the same engineers and architects that built France, also went to the UK and were reused.

Big Ben

Houses of Parliament

The River Thames flows directly behind it which I think makes it all the more amazing (especially as the sun is setting).

You can’t go to London and come home without a shot in a phone booth.

However, we are smiling but these booths were NASTY!  Holy cow it smelled like Urine and I was dirty!  There is no way that anyone would ever be able to go in that booth and use the phone with the door closed because you. would. die.

Whats really cool about these particular phone booths is that they are just around the corner from where I used to live when I traveled to London with the Covey family.  It was so fun to revisit our old stomping grounds. 

Tower of London

The Tower of London is SO MUCH FUN.  The experience is enriched all because of the tour guides also known as the “Beefeaters”.  They tell you all of the cool facts about the Towers history as well as keep the mood alive and as a bonus they have awesome jokes.

You might think that just “anyone” could become a tour guide at the Tower of London however that is not true.  In order to work there you have to have served at least 22 years in the military service, have reached at least the position of Warrant Officer and been awarded a good conduct medal.

The E II R on the outfit stands for ”Elizabeth Regina” and Regina in Latin stands for “Queen”; so the whole thing means “Elizabeth the Queen”.  When the Queen retires or dies then the next heir to the throne is Prince Charles and all the EIIR symbols throughout the whole country will change.  That is just crazy to think because the symbol is everywhere.

This is the castle of the Crown Jewels.  All the jewels of the royal family are still kept at the Tower of London which is still guarded day and night, which is why such high ranked military are the beefeaters to protect the Tower.

You gotta love these guys!  I seriously don’t know how they keep a straight face, never scratch a thing, and are ALWAYS looking straight ahead (and they will never laugh no matter how hard you try).  As it turns out the little black house that is behind them serves many good purposes such as shade for seriously hot days and protection from the rain when there is a down pour.  Regardless of the weather the guarding must go on…. I would hate that job!

This is Jas at the White Chapel of Armory at the Tower of London.  On the very top level there is a working chapel where all the Beefeaters can worship (the major religion being Christian).  The other levels are where the armory is kept.

The picture below is the armor of King Henry VIII.  His armor was HUGE!  He was 6ft 1 with a waist size of 52in and chest of 53in… lets just say he was a BIG guy in more ways then one.

This was inside the Chapel on the top floor.  In order to take a picture we had to sit through a 30 minute history lesson.  Which was ok because we got to just hangout and it was actually really pretty.

This is one of my favorite stories of at the Tower.  This is a toilet – they didn’t really use out-houses at the Tower instead they had these little rooms.  The picture below is the chute that all the crap comes out of and it drops directly into the moat.

Chute for crap

Moat

This is where the story comes in….

So historically a moat is put into place and filled with water to provide a defense line around the castle, which can be a great idea, unless you are Henry the III and have the moat dug to deep.  Which was exactlly the case for this moat.

Why would that be a problem you ask?  Because when the moat is dug to deep, the water can’t be all flushed making it impossible to flush out the crap, so it all sinks to the bottom and then starts to SMELL!  Gross!  This moat provided a defense line in more ways then one!  :)

The Babes hanging out having lunch at the Tower.

Of course your not in London if it doesn’t rain…

The Tower Bridge

He’s the most handsome person I know!

Buckingham Palace: The changing of the guards

Attempt #1

We went to the changing of the guards and thought it was so fun, but we didn’t get to see everything as good as we wanted to so instead of being disappointed we devised a plan.  We picked out the best places to stand in order to see the parade and the changing of the guards inside the gates and decided to come back the next morning….

Our master plan did NOT work because it was pouring buckets of RAIN.  Of course…. and the best part is in that kind of rain that don’t have the changing of the guards.  This was the only time I wished I had a little black house to stand in.  I was a little jealous of the guards….

Heaviest rain storm I have ever seen… and it came without warning…

YOU SNEEKY RAIN!

Jas in front of Westminster Abby!

It was fun to be there since there had been so much recent coverage of the marriage of Kate Middleton and Price William’s wedding, not only that but for its sheer history in London.  From the outside it looks very, very similar to Notre Dame…almost exact.

Jason pondering the meaning of life inside Westminster.

This saying was in the stone as you leave the building and I really liked it:

May God grant to the Living Grace,

To the Departed Rest,

To the Church of the World Peace and Concord,

And to us Sinner Eternal Life.

The London Eye

He loved it.  I hated it.

Views from the top!

This is the first time I stood up the whole ride.  I was seriously so scared.  I don’t know what has happened to me but in my old age I have really grown to HATE heights.  Something about standing in an almost completely glass capsule  5 million feet above the ground makes me nervous… I know call me crazy.

TASTY!

and we’ve never seen it in the states.

Speaking of Tasty… Cotto was AMAZING!

This restaurant was 100% Gluten Free and was Italian.  What?!

This was a breath of fresh air for us since we had such a hard time finding GF stuff for Jas in Paris.  After eating the food and loving I had to talk to the owner and find out why he offers so many GF options on his menu.  He said that 22 years ago he found out that he had Celiacs Disease and being in an italian family, and owning an italian restaurant he had to find a new way to cook without using wheat flour.  So he started coming up with his own recipes and now he offers as many GF options on his menu as regular.    It was such a treat!

The Menu

Trafalgar Square

Thai Square: Best Thai Food Ever!

Thanks for the recommendation Pam and David!

Inside the restaurant

We got here in the nick of time…

Did you know most European restaurants will open at like 11am for lunch and will close again at 2pm until dinner?

Bring on the double deckers.

I’m pretty sure these are the only type of buses Jason can get me to ride in.

We thought, what the heck lets go see a broadway!  Jersey Boys was great!

Outside the British Museum

The egyptian exhibit is a must see!

I was singing “Walk like an Egyptian” the whole time!

YOU SNEEKY BABE!

The Rosetta Stone

Q:  What is the Rosetta Stone?

A:  The Rosetta Stone is a stone with writing on it in two languages (Egyptian and Greek), using three scripts (hieroglyphic, demotic and Greek).

Q:  Why is it in three different scripts?

A:  The Rosetta Stone is written in three scripts because when it was written, there were three scripts being used in Egypt.

The first was hieroglyphic which was the script used for important or religious documents.

The second was demotic which was the common script of Egypt.

The third was Greek which was the language of the rulers of Egypt at that time.

The Rosetta Stone was written in all three scripts so that the priests, government officials and rulers of Egypt could read what it said.

Q:  When was the Rosetta Stone made?

A:  The Rosetta Stone was carved in 196 B.C. – That was a LONG time ago and this thing is still intact.

The Underground – AKA the Subway

I am proud to say that we only rode in a taxi from the airport to our hotel and from the hotel back to the airport.  The rest of the time we took the underground or rode on the bus.  Man we are rock stars!  Thanks NYC for teaching me that public transportation is doable in big cities.

The London Heathrow airport is the WORST airport I have ever been in… but I thought this was funny.  Do we really need a sign that as explosives as a Forbidden item – for real?  I thought some things just went unsaid.

Once we finally boarded the plane and took off we were happy to be getting back to America.  Our flight path back home was London to Paris, Paris to SLC.  Total time flying home was about 16 hours, and don’t worry we were in the very last row of the plane, next to the bathrooms and for some reason we didn’t sleep a wink the whole flight home.  Thank havens for the iPad!

The plan was for me to meet him at his gate, with a backup plan of meeting at the luggage pick-up after customs if I ran into any problems since we didn’t have phone service.  All I can say is I am so glad we had a backup plan!  I went to meet Jas at his gate only to realize that the Paris airport is not marked with any signs on which flight is incoming at each gate, there are no attendants standing at the gates, and there are no gate numbers, so it was impossible for me to tell which gate Jas would be arrive at.

I went through customs, figured out which luggage carousel he would be going to and about 40 minutes later I saw his smiling face come down the escalator!  After 2+ weeks I was so happy to see him!!

Once we got our luggage it was off to our hotel to drop off the bags and put on our ‘touristy’ outfits (you know… a hat, tennis shoes, camera around the next, Rick Steve’s “Best Of Europe” book and a fanny pack…. alright, not quite that far but just about!)

We seriously wasted no time.  Once we got things settled at the hotel we headed straight to the Eiffel Tower.  We didn’t even really know where we were going, but we knew the the Eiffel Tower was close and with Rick Steve’s in hand, we knew we could find it!

This is just moments before we arrived at the tower.  Classic picture: back pack on. Diet Coke in hand.  and Rick Steve’s in my arms.  His book was like the Europe Bible for me.  It is awesome because it makes traveling so easy!

We have arrived.  The tower was SWEET!  However, it was smaller then I imagined, but it did not disappoint.  We wanted to go to the top and see the view but the line to the elevator was like 3 hours long (with no fast pass option) so to make the dream come true we took the stairs!  That line only had like 3 people in it, so we were on our way up in no time.  There are over 300 stairs to climb to reach the first observation deck and about the same to reach the second.  As we climbed higher and higher I seriously started to get freaked out.  Jas climbed all the way to the second observation deck and got some really cool pictures!  Some fun facts about the tower:

It’s 81 stories high.

Upon its completion it surpassed the Washington Monument as the tallest building in the world and held the title for 41 years until Chrysler building was built in NYC in 1930.  However, in 1957 there was an antenna added to the top of the building not making it taller then the Chrysler building.

It was named after its designer, engineer Gustave Eiffel.

The tower was built as the entrance arch to the 1889 World’s Fair.

Standing right under the tower looking towards the city.

Views from the second observation deck.

I made it to the first platform!  It was high enough… don’t you think?!

Right after the Eiffel Tower we decided to go on a boat cruise around the city.  It was so fun to cruise around and get an idea of where everything was in the city.  Plus it was a nice break after climbing all the stairs at the Eiffel Tower! 

We took this picture on our boat cruise and I love it because it just shows the amount of detail there is on everything.  Even bridges are so detailed with statues, lamps, and swirly things, not to mention the gold!  I loved it!

Day Two:  We wake up starving and end up eating at a little cafe across from our hotel.  There are an overwhelming amount of Cafe’s in the city.  Almost all restaurants have the name Cafe in them.  This particular one didn’t look so bad so we thought we would give it a try.  The waiter/owner came to our table to take our order… so funny!  He knows no English and we know no French.  Needless to say I thought I was ordering an omelet and this is what came out.  What you can’t see (or maybe you can) is that the eggs and lettuce/tomato side thing is all covered in butter!  Lets just say it was always a surprise when we ordering anything.  We’d think we were getting one thing and out would come something totally different!

Fries were the one exception to the rule!  That was the one thing that we could count on coming out the way we were expecting.  They were honestly a staple in the diet since they are not only delicious but they are also Gluten Free!

Oh the Louvre!  This place was insanely huge!   The pyramid behind us is the entrance to all the good stuff.   The Louvre is where the famous Mona Lisa is kept as well as as so many others masterpieces.

In order to get through the front door there was of course a 2 hour wait which I was moaning about while standing in line…. then out of nowhere two guys walk up to us and hand us 2 tickets, and with a big smile they walked off.  This was AWESOME!

We didn’t even know if the tickets would work that he gave us, but we tried it and they did work.  SCORE!  We bypassed the line and went right in and saved ourselves 80 bucks.  This was a game changer!

Seriously, I don’t know what was more fun, going inside the Louvre or taking these pictures outside.

We couldn’t resist!

Seriously my favorite one!  Took me forever to get him to do it too!

Mona, we finally meet.  I thought she was going to be much bigger then she was… I would have been a little disappointed had we waited forever and paid, but since we didn’t I just smiled right back at her! 

Almost every room had something like this on the ceiling.  There is no wonder why it took hundreds of years to build these places.  There is tons of detail!

 The famous Venus de Milo.

There was no shortage of crazy looking sculptures/statues in Paris!

Obviously these would be something that one would want in a house.  Right?!

This statue was HUGE!  Instead of just having a boring old pillar, why not make it a statue and connect the head to the ceiling.   The French thought of everything!

Walking along the boardwalk.

Paris is split in half by the Seine River which runs down the middle of it.  You can tell where you are by knowing which side of the river you are on.  If your on the North side then you are on the right bank, if you are on the South side you are on the left bank with Notre-Dame right in the middle.  Thanks Rick Steve’s for teaching us what we needed to know!

Notre-Dame Cathedral

Did you know that Notre-Dame is 700 years old?!  And that Notre-Dame translated means “Our Lady” referring to Mary who is center stage of the cathedral.  I seriously loved this place.  I could believe how detailed it was for being built 700 years ago, but that was the theme through out Paris.

I love these statues that are carved into the side of the wall next to the entrance.  The guy holding his head in his hands is St. Denis who was beheaded for converting to Christianity and became a warning to others who thought about forsaking the Roman Gods.  The legend goes that when his head was cut off, he got up, tucked his head under his arm, paused at a fountain to wash off, and headed North until he found the right place to meet his maker.  The Parisians were convinced by this miracle and that’s when Christianity gained ground.

We walked a lot in Paris, but everything changed for the better when we decided to purchase a pass for the Hop on-and-off bus.  The buses picked up and dropped off at all the hot spots every 15 minutes so that worked out great!  We had so much fun listening to all the facts about things as we passed by the major sites.

Arc de Trimphe

This was such a cool place.  I actually didn’t know much about it before our trip but was of course excited to learn.   Napoleon had the Arc built to commemorate his victory at the battle of Austerlitz. There is no larger Arc in the whole world.

There are 12 converging boulevards that all have entrances ports around the Arc which turns out to be quite a site!  It must be the worlds largest round-about. 

After admiring the outside we climbed the 284 steps up the Arc to see the view at the top!  I seriously thought the stairs were going to go on forever.  But we made it to the top!

And this is what I looked like….

Deep Breaths!

As we reached the top of the steps, this is the very first thing that you see…. Are you for real?!

Not warm and welcoming after the climb to the top!

The view from the top of the Arc.

I LOVE how they groom the trees down the Champs-Elysees.  It’s like they chop the tops off but it looked so cool! I really want to do that to my own trees some day.

We just had to! 

I love this guy!

Public Restrooms on the street!  As soon as you walk in the door closes which caught me off guard!  I seriously thought they were going to be nasty (because if that was in NYC all the homeless people would be living in them) but remarkably it was super clean!

Taking the subway out to Versailles!

In the Gardens.

Overlooking the lower gardens.  Notice that all the grass is formed into shapes!  This place has the most amazing, detailed, designed gardens I have ever seen.  Crazy!

Growing Oranges!

Louis XIV had a thousand of these to amaze his visitors. In winter, they were kept in the greenhouses that surround the courtyard. On sunny days, they were wheeled out in their silver planters and scattered around the grounds.  This was to prove how amazing he was to the people to grow oranges in chilly France.

Get tried from all that walking?  Not a problem, we have just the solution;

Step 1:  Unwrap amazing chocolate.

Step 2:  Put into mouth.

see below for step 3…

Step 3:  Smile due to pure happiness!

Love this picture!

The fountain shows in the gardens!  They only have these going for like 2 hours a day, so make sure if you go to Paris that you check the times for the fountain “show” otherwise you will miss it.  We just happen to go late in the day and got to see them by chance.

At the gates of the palace, of course they would use Gold.

Heart shaped bushes and grass.  Cute!

Full size cathedral inside the palace.  This was crazy because all the people would be on the very bottom level, the King would be on the middle level, and there is a painting of God on the ceiling.  The idea was that the people would look up to the king, and the king would look to God.  Interesting set-up.

Hall of mirrors.

This is a PERFECT example of when we ordered something and got something completely different then what we thought!  We ordered a fancy cheese platter (or so we thought) and these gross things are what came!  Warm clumpy cheese, a caramel type of sauce, and a raspberry jam thing.  So SICK!

Thanks Paris! We had lots of fun… now we are off to London!

All Aboard!

Jas has been in Yerevan, Armenia for the last 2 weeks working with the At Task development team there. He has loved his experience working with the team, going on adventures around the country nightly, and building new friendships. When he was first asked to go, the wheels in my mind started turning and my life motto of “Go Big or Go Home” started going crazy!

We figured since he was already going to be on the other side of the world, that we should make a summer vacation out of it and have me come meet up with him!  We first wanted to go to Thailand, then it was Holland, and then we finally settled on Paris and London.

I am over the moon this morning, knowing that in 20+ hours I will meet up with him in Paris, after not seeing each other for 2 weeks!  Let the adventure begin!

This post is out of “order” so I will just have to catch up on our other adventures later like our Honeymoon and what’s been happening since then.  For now, its all about the our European Adventure!

I’m going to posting while we travel in order to keep track of what we’ve done and to let our families know we are alive and safe.  Visit often over the next 10 days if you want to see what we’ve been up to.

Au Revoir!