December 2011

December 1st, Devin had his last job interview, which was in Dallas.  Although he received a job offer from them too, the choice was pretty much between the jobs in Las Vegas and Washington D.C. We spent the weekend pondering about that...

Friday, we had our friend JoAnna take family pictures for us. Becca cooperated very well - only she kept signing "Please" in most of the pictures, because she wanted the toy JoAnna was using to get her attention.  I love our little family!  

After the pictures, we decided to splurge on Chipotle for a fast dinner (yum!); we were in a hurry to drive out to "Journey to Bethlehem".  A bunch of churches in the community get together every Christmas season to put this on; it's a recreation of the town of Bethlehem at some fair grounds out in the country (about 45 minutes from College Station).  You have to pay your taxes (a quarter) to get in past the Roman soldiers and some Roman leader, then you're taken by the Three Wisemen (who tell you about the Christ child being born) on their way to see King Herod.  You are shooed from Herod's presence with the warning to hurry or he might come after you - and the Wisemen leave you at the gates of Bethlehem to find your own way.  Inside Bethlehem it's crowded with every kind of shop you can think of (bread, cheese, fruits, spices, candle maker, the blacksmith's, wood-working...I can't remember them all!), the synagogue (we listened to a good sermon), some different craft options (we made an ornament), a wedding party teaching dances and roaming the streets, and a pen of different animals - next to which was a little stable with Jesus laying in the manger, and Mary and Joseph quietly watching over Him.  Everything else was quite loud - there were so many costumed volunteers, besides the crowd of normal folks like us.  It was a different picture of Bethlehem than you normally see, but it made us think - because it was probably more like the real thing. We really enjoyed it!  As we left, there was a high school choir singing Christmas hymns outside, and we stood there awhile to cuddle and listen in the semi-chilly starlit night...we could feel the spirit of Christmas.  

Here's Becca the next morning - she takes great delight in playing with our Christmas decorations!  We never really got many ornaments on the tree, because she just kept taking them off.

I wanted to take a panoramic picture of our bedroom to help us remember what it looked like, before we started packing:

Then I decided to document some of our sparse Christmas decorations this year (we thought Santa and his reindeer with the extra long reins was funny):

We set Becca to work, packing everything up for us - but she just sat around on the job and couldn't think outside of the boxes:

Actually, I had already been packing little by little, for a couple weeks.  But that Saturday, we began packing in earnest, as we also began a fast to decide which job to take.

Becca was shocked into speechless solemnity when we told her our choice the next day:

We're moving to Las Vegas, Nevada for Devin to work at Kimley-Horn & Associates!  Hooray!  We feel good about our decision and we're excited for this new chapter in our life.  KHA is a private engineering firm with a fabulous reputation - this is a really great opportunity for Devin's career, and we'll get to be closer to my side of the family.

December 6th was Devin's last day of school for perhaps a very long time (he plans on getting his PhD someday) - it was also the 3rd anniversary of our first date.  My, how time flies.

Speaking of flying time, Becca turned 11 months old.  She is getting so big.  She learned how to say "Dada" early this month, and that makes Daddy and Mommy so giddy with parental love!

We had Devin's colleague and friend, Brian, and Brian's girlfriend, Kristin, over for dinner and to play games. Devin has made a lot of friends through school and work and ITE - it's hard to believe that we'll be gone soon.

We tried to get lots of time in with our friends before we moved; in the same night we had the missionaries over for dinner for the last time (one Elder has been here almost since Becca was born!), and then I ran off to Book Club for the last time - I will miss that! Maybe I'll start a Book Club for our new ward in Las Vegas, if they don't already have one.  While I was gone, it was...Bathtime!  Daddy's a sucker for those wet eyelashes and pouty lips: 

Our friends, the Kellers came over while I was at Book Club, so we had a good chat (and some good cookies!) with them when I came home.  There are so many good people here in College Station.

One of Becca's favorite toys right now is her glasses - they can literally change her mood.  I usually reserve them for Sacrament Meeting. Ha ha!

The Brimley's joined us for "Christmas at the Creek" - a little tradition here in College Station.  There are Christmas lights everywhere throughout the park, lots of decorations, a manger scene, a ton of performances by different local talent, Santa Claus, free hot chocolate and cookies (I'll admit, that was a big draw for me), hay rides, an imported pile of snow, and a bunch of other Christmas-y things.  We had fun on our last fling with "the Brim's".  

Don't let her face fool you - Becca was not bored, she had a great time

Amanda, Brad, and Annette

Atten-tion!

I think this kangaroo was pretending to be a reindeer...strange

Love this face of Becca's

Becca giving "hugs"

She loves to find people's noses now

Waiting in line to see Santa

Becca's first encounter with Santa Claus was amusing - she just tried to figure out who this guy was and what was on his face:

Mesmerized

"You know, I'm not sure that beard is real..."

"I've got my eye on you, Santa!"

Becca and Annette are best friends, they just don't know it yet

Admiring the beautiful ornaments

Becca in front of their huge Christmas tree

Having a kid makes Christmas so much more fun!

Saturday morning, we did some more packing up - Becca likes playing in the empty cupboards:

After we met our quota of boxes packed for the day, we drove down to Sugar Land to see Flynn's Christmas concert - he's in a boy's choir that tours and is high in demand.  They did a really nice job and it was fun to finally get to see Flynn performing.  We spent the night, but came back early for church because I was teaching in Relief Society - my last time!  I couldn't help crying although it usually didn't seem like we were really leaving.  

Becca looked like a happy little elf in her Christmas dress:

Sunday night was the long awaited multi-church Musical Celebration of Christmas, which I've been helping put on again (I did it last year too).  I really didn't have too much to do this year, so it was nice to not be so stressed out.  Devin was the final number, singing and playing "Silent Night" on the guitar.  He did a fabulous job, and the whole concert was a success.  Mom and Ryan came up to see it, and Becca sure enjoyed sitting with them. 

Monday morning, I got up bright and early for my last run with Brittany Beus and Amanda Brimley.  But they had been planning a surprise; instead, we went to Kolache Rolf's (my first time) and ate some yummy kolache's while reminiscing over the past and speculating about the future.  I will miss them both very much!  I hope we'll see them again.  Here we are in all our early morning glory:

Tuesday night, we had our Tithing Settlement with Bishop England, and then, that was the end!  We turned in our keys and other things for our callings, and bid farewell to the bishop, our chapel, and the College Station 2nd Ward.  We loved that ward very much.

Our original plan for Christmas (after deciding to take the KHA job in Las Vegas) was to pack up and drive the moving truck to Las Vegas on the 15th, spend a couple days finding a place to live, and then drive up to Salt Lake to be with my family until after New Year's.  We changed our plans, though, and concocted a delicious surprise:  although we told the Moore family only our original plan, instead, we coordinated with our landlord to leave all our boxed up possessions at home, changed the dates of the moving truck, and bought plane tickets to Salt Lake for the 14th and more tickets back to Texas just before New Year's.  We decided that with it being the first Christmas season without Dad Moore, it would be really good to be with the family. We had a devil of a time keeping that secret for three and a half weeks!  And we felt quite guilty about all the lying...but not guilty enough to tell the truth.

Anyway, on the 14th we awoke early to make the three and a half hour trip up to the Dallas Love airport, where our good friends, the Christensen's, met us to take our car.  Becca did a really good job on the airplane this time - she let Daddy sleep (he earned it, doing all the driving on the way there and letting me take a nap in the car) and was pretty content to sit on my lap.  When we arrived at the Salt Lake airport, we were met by cold weather!  It wasn't too bad, actually, but definitely the coldest Becca has felt in her short lifetime.  We thought her light coat didn't quite cut it, so we came up with another diverting solution:

The next two and a half weeks in Utah were a blur of family, food, friends, food, fun, and food.  I love Christmastime, and I love my family's Christmas traditions, and I loved sharing that all with Becca for the first time.  The only sad part was NO SNOW. Oh well.  We spent a lot of time just relaxing together, but also did many fun activities - it's all kind of a foggy feeling of general happiness now in my little memory, so I will have to just rely on the pictures we took to tell the story.

The whole family went to Liberty Park to see a neat nativity.  It was darn cold, but we all bundled up and huddled in a group as we were bid to "follow the light" by a torch-bearing shepherd who guided us around to different scenes, and listened to a song at each site.  It was pretty neat.

Becca's improvised beanie - Sumo wrestler style

Wrapped up with Dad

Daniel and Trent's mouths were too frozen to really smile, I guess...

Little Keely, snug in her stroller

Devin and Ric's faces were frozen in a different manner...

Ser and Dad

Shar and Mom

Creighton, by our shepherd guide

Stratton - making a grass angel, I guess

Becca got tons better at standing on her own, especially with all the encouragement she got from everyone.  If we could help distract her from thinking about it, she would stand for awhile until she realized what she was doing.  She also learned to climb stairs, under Daddy's watchful tutelage.  We don't have stairs at home, so it was quite the novelty to her.

We were able to attend the annual Flegal Family Christmas Party.  Some thing never change!  But it's also always a shock to see how much my cousins' kids have grown.  We're all getting old.  The feast was as good as ever, it was fun to catch up on life with my relatives, and Santa Claus coming to our party is a hoot.

Vacation-beard-growing Devin (doesn't he look great in that sweater?! I made him wear it) and sober-looking Becca

Ali, Lottie, Karina, and Becca

Playing hacky-sack while the food settles

The Flegal Santa has always been a little red-neck - but he used to wear only red long-handled underwear (you know, the kind with the bum-flap?)

Santa (my cousin, Andrew, this year) handed out oranges and candy canes to everyone as he read their name off the list - it's that gigantic roll of paper in his right hand; it took ages!

Trent had a concert at the Assembly Hall on Temple Square - they did some way cool songs.  I'm proud of him for all his accomplishments.

It took me back to when I did the same concert my senior year

Trent is behind the left-hand corner of that bar...we sat in a bad spot

After Trent's concert, we enjoyed the lights on Temple Square, a holiday must.

We're standing in the exact spot of our first date, where we lost track of time and just talked, oblivious to the Nativity presentation we were supposed to be listening to

We went to another of Trent's performances one morning, at Olympus Jr. High.  I've got a handsome kid brother.

Devin spear-headed the organization of "Manite II" (formerly known as "Man Night").  More Rock Band, movies, junk food, excessive drinking of novelty sodas, and trying to stay up all night.

Becca's messy and delighted eating was amusing for everyone.  Skipping ahead, I wish I had a picture of the horrific scene when Becca pulled down the entire pitcher of grape juice right after the prayer for our Christmas Eve family dinner.  Boy, did she look surprised.

We tried really hard to get Becca to walk - she was so close.  Most of the time, she just did what follows in this Friday video - a kind of falling forward while moving her legs.  But, she took what can be called her first real steps during our family Christmas Eve devotional the next day (sorry, not captured on film).  Our baby is a toddler!

Trent had some good times with Becca - having her walk in his ski boots and try on his glasses:

Devin and I shared my old bedroom with Becca - she was not a good roommate; she woke up most nights and in order to not wake up the whole house, we had to cave and bring her to bed with us if we wanted any sleep.  This was not my favorite thing.  However, it was kinda fun to wake up all together on Christmas morning.  

Becca, in her new pajamas, playing with an ornament and patiently waiting for everyone else to wake up and get ready:

We read the story of Christ's birth in the Book of Mormon, something I started doing by myself as a teenager on Christmas morning:

Becca put in a call on her shoe-phone:

And when we finally rousted the boys out of bed, it was time to stand in age order on the stairs for that classic picture:

Becca's looking pretty solemn, not yet grasping what Christmas morning is all about:

The photos that follow don't really need to be explained - just the joy of Christmas giving and being with family.  It was a lovely morning.

Our little family after church - only Sacrament meeting, and the best part for me was the postlude of "The Hallelujah Chorus" that everyone was invited to join.

We spent the night at Serity and Ric's house, watching the first Sherlock Holmes, in preparation to go to the theater to see the second one the following night.  The next morning we enjoyed a cut-throat game of Settlers of Catan.  I'm afraid I was a little too ruthless towards Ric - he might never forgive me.

All the cousins, playing with their Christmas toys:

Before we were supposed to leave to see "Sherlock Holmes 2" (which was awesome!), Keelian got into Serity's makeup:

I had to document our genius wrapping job of our Christmas present to Serity - can you guess what it is?

Devin babysat Becca so I could get together with Ali and Melissa.  We ate Cafe Rio, and chatted about mom stuff - it was good to see them again and have some "girl time".

Sadly, I didn't take any pictures of our trip down South - Provo-ways, that is.  We met our friends, Jeremy and Tiffany, at a pizza place.  They brought their little baby boy twins and we had a nice chat.  Right after that we headed over to see Grandma Rogers at our old abode.  We sure do love her and miss her!  She hadn't met Becca yet, so it was great to introduce them.  We ran into our old next-door neighbors too, Justin and Sunny - who had a little girl a month after we had Becca.  By this time, Becca was falling apart, but we had plans to visit Skylar and Alicia in their new home in Pleasant Grove.  They gave us a tour and we tried to play a game of Ticket to Ride: Asia.  It was good to see all of our old friends!

Here's a panoramic view (yes, we're still getting a kick out of our new camera) of a typical family dinner - which Sharlee moved during, against orders, so she has an abnormal look.

Moments after completing a really complex puzzle (we did it without the border - hard!), Jacob and I sit in a stupor not knowing what to do next after we all spent weeks on it:

Most of the adult members of the family attended a session together at the Jordan River temple early one morning:

Devin thought it'd be good to introduce pickles to Becca's diet.  She didn't agree:

The night before we were to fly home, we had a Goodbye/Becca's-Early-Birthday Party.  She wasn't allowed any cake yet (she was sick), but she loved the candle and is honing her present-opening skills:

Devin got an extra present that Dad found for him...sparking that old PEZ addiction...

We thought we'd try to take a picture of all the grand-kids together, but that proved to be next to impossible after bedtime:

We managed a family photo - after we postponed our real family photo shoot to after Serity has her baby:

Serity's boys are very obedient smilers when commanded:

I'm not sure why I'm including this less-than-flattering picture of us, but history must be documented, I suppose:

We had to get a family picture of everyone in their cloud Snuggies - Daniel's present to everyone:

And then, Becca and Keelian kissed each other goodbye and said farewell until next time (Becca's still trying to get down the closed mouth part of kissing):

Our carry-on luggage for the flight back to Dallas:

We were worn out after the plane rides, but we still had to drive from Dallas to Houston.  It was a long day! When we arrived at the Moore home, late in the evening on the 30th, fortunately everyone was gone - so we had time to make our surprise even more exciting:

We were pleased to have a few days to be with the family and celebrate the New Year - but more of that later.  Looking back over 2011, so much has happened.  Becca came to join us, Dad Moore went on ahead of us, and we have learned so much.  We are most grateful for our family and friends and for all the blessings that Heavenly Father has given us.  There are big changes in our very near future, and we are anxious to experience what's next.  We will always remember 2011 as a very important year of our life.