I ♥ Photoshop

Photoshop is the greatest thing ever created (besides Peter). Peter's best smiles for the camera never seem to coincide with a clean face or neutral background. But thanks to Photoshop I can turn this

into this

Now it's ready for grandparents and Christmas present worthy!

I ♥ Family

Oma & Opa with all five of their great-grandchildren. At least a few of them smiled!

So I'm going to milk this past weekend for another blog post (it was a big weekend)! Definitely one of the best parts of having the surprise party was having so many family members there. It was wonderful to catch up with people that I hadn't seen in a long time. For the last 10 years many of my out of state cousins have come to Utah to attend college; Sunday dinners at Oma and Opa's became very crowded and fun. Unfortunately, a lot of them have moved away to various distant locations (my cousin Krista is in Dominica!). And now it seems like all my younger cousins are going to Idaho for college. So it was great to have such a large family gathering.

My cousin Quinten, his wife Kate, and their 3 children decided to drive up from Arizona at the last minute. I was really excited when I found out they were coming. I haven't seen them in over 3 years and I had never met their youngest child Paige. I had fun catching up with Kate and Peter had fun running around with his second cousins.

Peter with his second cousins: Paige, Rhaegan, Sam & Tyson

Peter had a lot of fun playing with Paige and "showing off" for her. Isn't Paige adorable!

I ♥ McDonald's Monopoly

October was Ryan’s favorite month before he married me. Watching MLB playoffs, attending BYU football games, following every NFL game—what more could a guy want? Then I came along and I brought with me an enthusiasm (okay, I admit it’s really an obsession) with McDonald’s Monopoly. McDonald’s yearly Monopoly promotion really is a brilliant move. They entice thousands of non-customers into their restaurants with the lure of winning a million dollars. And they encourage their regular customers to come more often. I mean if a person can win a million dollars by simply drinking Diet Coke, why not? It sure is easier than eating bugs while living for 39 days in a remote location with 15 other incredibly smelly people!

Has anyone ever won the million? I don’t know, but I do know not too many people have won the lesser cash prizes. And yet this does not hamper my passion. I just KNOW I am going to win (of course I have thought this for several years). Every October I quite simply get giddy at the idea of peeling off a new game piece from my food wrapper. And poor Ryan kindly eats more McDonald’s food in those 3 weeks in October than he does in the other 49 weeks of the year. I just simply have to collect as many game pieces as possible without actually eating a Big Mac (no amount of money will make me do that). And since they started the online game a few years ago, my quest for game pieces has intensified. When I was pregnant 2 years ago, I was known to ask other people for their game pieces instead of throwing them away—it’s amazing how little shame I had when pregnant! I am pathetic, but I can’t deny the embarrassing truth: I heart McDonald’s Monopoly. Please don't think less of me.