Holiday wrap up and more!

So I realize most of these are out of order, and there are even some duplicate pictures you've already seen, but I do what I can with what little free time I have!! So enjoy :)

Ella and I went for a little hike on Saturday...we both had cabin fever, so even though she was tired, we fired up the Jeep Stroller and headed up the mountain side!

Here's my cute little stinker playing in her clothes hamper. She thought this was pretty cool :) She's still not crawling yet, which really is fine with me! But she is very close, she gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth, scoots backwards, and sideways, but no forward motion yet!

This was Christmas morning. Ella had some breakfast and then opened her gifts. Her favorite was her Lullapet, it sings songs and tells stories. What a perfect first Christmas we had with her!

This was my moms Christmas masterpiece. It was a white chocolate peppermint cheesecake cake!! All set on a peppermint candy platter. My mom rocks!

Some pic's of the classic Nativity. Ben was Joseph, Keslee was Mary and Ella was baby Jesus. My mom read from the bible while we watched on, it was very sweet :)

Here was the Christmas Eve feast....and it was AMAZING!!! Tenderloin, potatoes, carrots, salads....oh man, my stomach is growling just typing that out. Can't wait for next years dinner!!!

We got a new niece in December. Molly Luekengah!! She is a precious little doll :)

I realize I already posted about my get together with my friends, but there are a couple more pic's here :) Love this tradition!

Isn't she THE most beautiful little girl you've ever witnessed?!?! I mean, you've heard the saying that a smile can light up a room, but hers actually does. LOVE HER!!!

Some extra Santa pic's...I'm hopin' next years Santa pics are this successful!

Here is Santa. How nice of him to fly in all the way from the North Pole days before Christmas just to get pictures with my little girl ;)

This was one of the coolest things we did this year. This is a refugee family from Africa. It is one woman, I think she is 26 or 27, taking care of her four kids and two of her sisters kids. By herself. When my mother in law met her last year, they had NOTHING in their apartment. So she and some other women in the stake rallied and with the help of Linda's employer and donations furnished her apartment. We thought it would be great to omit sibling gifts this year and take that money to give Christmas to them. We got clothes, coats, toys and some food and took it over a couple of weeks before Christmas. They were SO friendly and just seemed happy despite their meager living situation. We picked up some pizza's before we got there and it's a good thing, because sneaking a peak in their kitchen all they had was Ramen Noodles. It was so great to get the nieces and nephews involved as well, because they really got into it. My niece Alina was so excited that she had picked out three of her own dolls and new exactly who she was going to give them to :) This truly brought back the true spirit of Christmas for me. It felt so much better to give to someone who genuinely needed such basic things like coats and blankets, as opposed to buying some lame $15 gift for your brother who already has anything they could ever want. I hope to make this a new tradition :)

**Oh, as for me...I'm doing something called "Whole 30" this month, basically cutting out sugar, dairy and gluten from my diet for 30 days, then continuing to eat healthy after that. I have also been exercising almost every day for the past three weeks. I will post before and after pics at the end of this month. It's not easy but I'm already feeling the benefits!!! Go me!!!