Merry Christmas 2010!

So I know you can currently see this as the header of my blog, but I wanted to make a post about the Christmas card I had made this year! It turned out beautifully thanks to the help of my WONDERFUL sister-in-law Meghan. Yes, she took the pictures. Yes, she made the layout. Yes, she got them ordered and delivered asap. Yes, she IS amazing. Thanks for asking! :) Anyway, more to come about Christmas as the festivities begin, but until then, MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM THE SHIPPS!

(And hopefully it will be a White Christmas for you, as I'm hoping it is for me!)

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

Finally! Seems like I was just a little bit behind on everything this year... shopping, sending, decorating, enjoying! :) But guess what! I got it done!! :)

I just wanted to share with you some of my Christmas decorations. They may not be big or fancy, but they fit my little apartment perfectly. And I love them!

Especially this nativity scene, which I think I've had since I was born. I'll have to get my Mom to tell me the story on it. For the longest time I always thought it was a Precious Moments set, but upon further inspection this year... I'm realizing that it might not be! And if it is, then it's an ancient/retro Precious Moments set that must have been made before they had the signature "Precious Moments" eyes... Regardless, I just LOVE this nativity:And my little snowman and Christmas tree countdown calendar that sits on top of my TV:
And a fun little doorknob hanger snowman jingle bell thingy. I got this last year from Trevor's grandparents, I believe:
And this I know I got from Trev's grandparents Kayle and Deanna... it's a fun little winter rug. Cute little penguins all wrapped up in hats and scarves:
Here's my typical Christmas tree shot. You might be able to see some of my Precious Moments ornaments. These are for SURE legitimate Precious Moments items. I guess my Mom made me into a collector (it started with my "Baby's First Christmas" ornament and I get a new one almost every year!), and I'm grateful. I think they are such sweet, darling little figurines! Anyway,this is honestly my favorite corner of the house this time of year. Sometimes I just turn off the lights and let the tree just glow. It's such a peaceful and yet exciting feeling to sit by the glow of the lights on the tree! One of life's little pleasures, I guess:
I just LOVE Christmastime, and most of all because the whole world seems to turn their thoughts to peace, love, happiness, and, most of all, Jesus Christ. What a wonderful gift He gave all of us by laying down His life so that we might also overcome death and live again and have the opportunity to return to the presence of our Father in Heaven. No other gift given was greater than this gift that Christ gave so willingly to every man that would ever walk the earth. It's amazing that such a gift can be so universal, but so personal all at the same time.

I hope you take time to enjoy the true meaning of Christmas this year. Read the Christmas story in Luke. Listen to Christ-filled songs! Just enjoy every single minute of it and try not to get too caught up in the "busy" and the "buying" of this season.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Temple Square - November 27, 2010

On Friday November 27th, during the long Thanksgiving weekend while Mical and her family were in town, we all went up to Temple Square to see the lights. It was gorgeous, but it was also SO cold! Below is the whole crew less Meghan (taking the pictures) and Kelan, her youngest, who was sitting bundled up in the stroller next to her.For this next picture, everyone had been getting pictures of their families, so I asked if we could get one of our little "family": Me and Trevor .... :)
Like I said before, it was SO cold - almost too cold to enjoy our visit. Almost. It was still great. And the best part is that they were selling cups of hot chocolate to help warm us up! Good news! The hot chocolate worked... I felt much warmer after drinking it. That is, everything except my VERY cold/numb toesies. Poor little digits. I can still remember how much they hurt! :( But, at least that was the only really cold part of me, thanks to hot chocolate and awesome earmuffs: And, finally, a bit of family history for all of you... apparently this next picture is one of the first pictures the "original" Shipp family has taken (just them) and all together in a long time! From L to R: Mical, Meghan, Trevor, Jill, Troy, Russell, and Trent. Oddly enough, I just noticed all the "kids" are standing in order of age from Mical down to Trent! Such a good lookin' family I married into!! :) Hope you enjoyed these AWESOME pictures, courtesy of Meghan. Thanks Meg! Also, please forgive me for taking forever to post. More fun posts to come in the next few days and weeks!

And an early Merry Christmas!!! :)

Birthday Boy!!

Today is very special (and its not just because it's Black Friday). Yep. There's something even MORE important than shopping that happened today - and that's Trevor turning 26 years old!! Happy Birthday to my sweet husband!!!The best part, to me, about this picture is how you can genuinely see how much happier and better he is feeling now!! That's probably the best birthday present he could have been given. However, I did get him some other fun things like new light-colored jeans, socks, scarf & gloves, and a very yummy-looking ice cream cake (we have yet to try it)!

I am so grateful to have such a great husband (and good-looking too!) who is willing and able to not only provide for our family, but also to help out around the house and make sure I'm happy too. He's one of the biggest blessings in my life and I really do love him.

Happy Birthday Sweetheart!!!!

Why Do I NEVER...

... have anything interesting to write about!?!?

Oh well. I guess for now you get to be entertained with recent life updates!

#1 - Trevor is feeling SO much better! After nearly 6 weeks of feeling AWFUL, we got him to a doctor again who prescribed prednisone (a steroid) to treat his UC flare-up. And guess what! They work soo well and he's so happy to feel back to normal. Of course, you can guess that missing over a month of school was not going to work, so he also discontinued from classes for the semester. Good news? We get at least 50% of his tuition back and have applied to get up to 85% back! Other good news? He'll continue classes next semester so Wymount is letting us stay where we live and not kicking us out! Whew! Talk about blessings :)

#2 - By the end of December, my entire department at work will be completely different. I recently had to let one person go (it just wasn't the right job for him), one is moving back to Arizona, and one is ready to move to a different department within the company. Sigh. It's stressful just thinking about finding, hiring, and training 3 new people in the next month. Wish me luck and pray for me!

#3 - Still LOVING Netflix! I think I'm on disc 6 of season 1 of Charmed. I just LOVE that movies show up in my mailbox. Also love the instant movies! Ahhh, definitely one of the best decisions I've made in a while.

#4 - Getting ready for the Christmas program at church. It's coming up in less than 3 weeks now. I'm trying not to panic. ;) I'm sure it will all turn out fine, right? RIGHT?

#5 - Got some more NEW BOOTS! Cute, huh? Very similar to the gray ones that I love, minus the wedge heel. That's my very favorite part of cold weather - the excuse to wear boots and other cute sweaters and such!

#6 - Finally picked up my yoga training certificate. Haha. Yes, yes, I know - I finished the training in March. For some reason I kept thinking they would mail it to me and finally figured out I had to go in and grab it. Good news? They still had it! I took it home and framed it! It all feels very legitimate and complete now. I'm still up to teach you some yoga if you're interested!

#7 - Just REALLY REALLY excited for Thanksgiving and the fact that this week is a 3-day work week! Woo hoo! Ready to spend time with family and eat some goooood food!

Peace out for now! And comment, please! Because I don't even know if anyone even reads my scarcely-used blog anymore! :(

Quote of the Day

Well, really, this has kind of been more like my quote of the week/month/year. It is exactly what I need to remember on a daily basis as I travel through a particularly tough time in my life:

"Patience is not passive resignation, nor is it failing to act because of our fears. Patience means active waiting and enduring. It means staying with something and doing all that we can--working, hoping, and exercising faith; bearing hardship with fortitude, even when the desires of our hearts are delayed.

Patience is not simply enduring; it is enduring well!"

- President Dieter F. Uchtdorf

I hope this week, as you find you must exercise patience in your life, that you will remember this new and improved definition of patience. Don't just sit there and wait for it to end - get up and DO something!

Good night!

Happy Halloween! 2010

Well... it seems that Halloween 2010 turned out much more fun than I thought it would! :) Since Trevor has been sick all month, we really didn't make any plans and so I didn't expect anything special out of Halloween this year. But - surprisingly - I made lots of good memories!

The first memory begins at work, where we had a little Halloween party on Friday where we all had the option of dressing up. The next couple pictures are some of the people I work with, all in our costumes.From L to R we have: Elias, the Indian; Sally as Luna Lovegood, Anna as the P23 Client Relations Witch; Me as the "Queen Bee"; Alyssa as another saucy Witch; and Rosie as Octomom, expecting her ninth child. :) In the second picture, Ben decided to join in. He was a Police Officer, but you can't see his costume because he's hiding.
Elias, Sally, Anna, and Me make up the Client Relations department that I manage. We have fun pretty much all the time :)

On Saturday, most folks in Utah went trick-or-treating. So, I decided to decorate our door for the potential passers-by. We left candy out because I was going down to my sister-in-law Meghan's house for the evening while Trevor laid low at home, and I knew he wouldn't want to keep getting up to pass out candy.
Please note the un-carved pumpkins. We sort of ran out of time/energy to carve the pumpkins, so I quickly drew a face on one of them before I left. Haha :)
Then, for the rest of the night, I got to spend time down at Meghan's house. I got to walk around the block trick-or-treating with her kids and my in-laws. It was so much fun except for the -19238 degree temperatures outside. Well, ok, so it wasn't THAT cold, but a storm blew through right before the night began, leaving everything wet, sleet-y, and verrry cold. Especially with the winds blowing out of Springville Canyon. Regardless, I had fun and I know the kids did too.

Please excuse the VERY poor quality picture of the kids grabbing their candy. I figure an awful picture is better than none? I was too far away to get a good picture with or without a flash, so I had to use a photo-edit program to make it brighter and that, of course, makes the pictures very grainy. But anyway, I hope it's worth something to someone :)
After trick-or-treating, I got to eat some pizza, lots of candy, and we all had a fun time visiting with each other. To see my ADORABLE niece and nephews, feel free to visit Meghan's blog HERE.

Trevor's been begging me to watch a scary movie with him for years. I always chicken out because I HATE scary movies. So, this year, I told him I'd watch one I've already seen before, namely "What Lies Beneath". Well, I went to blockbuster to grab it a couple nights ago and the last copy had been rented right before I got there! Oops! :) I guess I lucked out. But then, Trevor and I decided just to give in and purchase Netflix when we realized we could stream the movies on our Wii console. So, we are now proud owners of some of the newest technology and I am SO excited. I'm waiting for Disc 1 of Season 1 of Charmed to arrive in the mail any day! Eek! I love that show :)
But anyway, on with the story - so we purchased Netflix and we decided to watch "The Sixth Sense" because What Lies Beneath was a mail-order only instead of instant movie. Needless to say, it was scary enough for me, and hopefully Trevor will be satisfied.... that is, until Halloween NEXT year!

Hope yours was fun as well! :)