Forward movement

So about twenty minutes after my last post, Lynny woke up and we started to play/learn. She's working on learning to crawl at the moment, seeing how she's mastered balancing on her hands and knees, and is pretty good at the rock-back-and-forth. The next step is forward motion, right?
Well, here it is. I caught it on camera. Granted, she did it a couple times before I managed to get the camera out, so this isn't the actual first forward motion, but you get the idea.

The most magical place of all...

What do the subjects of these two pictures have in common?

They're both going to be in Disneyland during the first week of March!
That's right, gentle readers, I'm finally going to Disneyland. I've never been to any Disney theme park, and it seems to be one of those things that you can't really understand until you've been, so Daniel and I decided that it's probably about time that I experience it.

Our best friends, Jessica and Brennan, have annual passes to Disneyland and were planning on going (again) in March and invited us to tag along. They were already planning on spending the gas money and paying for a hotel, so they invited us to come along and join in the fun.

We weren't sure if we were going to be able to swing it--money's been really tight the past few months--but we decided we would carefully save our pennies (aka Daniel's bi-weekly plasma donation money) to try and be able to go. We also used our connections in the hotel biz (Daniel's brother-in-law works for Marriott) to get a cheap-cheap hotel room pretty close to the park, as our contribution to the travel expenses. But we still weren't sure if it was going to be financially possible.

Well, good news everyone. We just filed our taxes and our tax return turned out to be awesome. Not only will we be able to finish paying off our credit card, our student loans, and pay a huge chunk on our car loan, we'll have enough left over to go to Disneyland for sure! Basically we're pretty stoked. Our goal of having zero debt in three years is looking a lot more feasible than before. Who would have thought having a baby and me not working would pay off so much?

So for those who have been to Disneyland, what do I need to see and do while I'm there? We'll only have three days, so I want to plan ahead so I can hit as much as possible in that short amount of time.

I've started something new...

I've started something I've been planning on doing for a LONG time now. I've created a food blog. I won't say much more about it, but here's the link:

www.creatingmomskitchen.blogspot.com

I don't really have regular internet access, as many of you know, and I'm still figuring out what exactly I want it to be, but I'm working on it. Go, enjoy, and let me know what you think!

I'll be home for Christmas...

I love being home for the holidays. My family has tons of traditions (from the traditional English dinner on Christmas Eve, to banging pots and pans at midnight on New Year's) and it's been wonderful to start bringing my own little family into those. This year we were in Virginia for Christmas day and it was wonderful! We all dressed in our Christmas finest for dinner and then gathered around the living room for a game of grab-bag, which is our family's version of white elephant...on steroids.
We've had a great time getting Lynny and her cousin Olivia together and watching them become more and more aware of each other, as well as letting the adults spend some time relaxing. Here are just a few pictures of what's been happening with the Gibsons in the Meppen home.

Christmas Eve, just before dinner. I like my hair in this picture and Daniel's characteristic half-smile.

Gramma and Grampa were dancing to "Doc Severinson and the Tonight Show Band" playing some good ol' Christmas Songs waiting for Christmas dinner to finish cooking. That album was the only Christmas music we had on tape growing up so we were all sad when the tape finally got too stretched to play anymore. Then, my freshman year at BYU, Molly found the CD for me. It's made a great comeback, of course!

The result of one really good grab-bag gift: some awesome craziness and a few really great pictures. (I left the red-eye in for dramatic effect...and because I haven't figured out how to use my mom's picture editing software.)Lynny loves bathtime, and it's even more fun at Gramma's house. Why? Read on...
Because she gets to take a bath with her cousin Olivia! They've been doing lots together...
Like modeling Christmas dresses for the camera...
and giving each other beauty tips... "Nice ribbon!"

"Thanks! Let's see what we can do with yours..."

But they have a hard time sharing sometimes. See what happened when they both wanted the same thing? (Yes, that isn't really a toy; it's the package the toy came in.)