Richmond Getaway

Last week we reached a bit of a breaking point. Sam's current project has been a bit intense. That's the nice way of saying it. Several 60-80 hour weeks, working Saturdays and Sundays, only 1 day off in a month, one 22-hour shift-- it's basically enough to cause a full-on mental breakdown (let's not forget there is a one-hour commute each way). Once I realized how soon I was likely to melt into a puddle of stress and exhaustion (Sam, too), I declared a necessary vacation. Sam told work he was taking the weekend off (confused as to how we got to the point where you actually have to request the weekend off), and he would take Monday off too. We decided to head to Richmond for a little getaway. Perhaps not exotic, but it is a close drive and a fun, new place to explore. I emailed my dear friend Jenna, who recently moved away from Richmond, and she gave me a wonderful list of tips, which served as the base for our itinerary. It was the perfect weekend to mend our worn-out little souls, and we all came back refreshed and ready to face the last stretch of the project.

When we first got there, we hit up the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Of course Bria loved this stained glass of a fancy lady. Her other favorites were paintings of flowers. She usually does pretty well in museums, but I think going there directly from a 1.5 hour car ride wasn't the best idea. Still, we got to see a lot of beautiful artwork, and we enjoyed exploring the lovely grounds of the museum as well.

We spent a lot of time lounging in our hotel room-- because this was definitely a vacation dedicated to relaxing. We swam in the hotel pool both days, enjoyed the breakfast buffet, and ate a lot of junk food. Bria had never slept in a hotel before, so I was nervous about her ability to fall asleep with us awake in the room. Sam and I huddled in the corner, playing on our phones in the pitch dark room (thank you, free wifi!), until Bria drifted off to sleep. Then we hooked our laptop up to the tv and watched a movie-- wearing headphones so as not to disturb the B. It may have been my favorite part of the trip.

Monday we spent at Maymont, an incredible and beautiful park in Richmond. We explored the Italian and Japanese gardens as well as some of the other grounds before calling it a day. The only downer of the vacation was that I had a really horrible cold (and I didn't have sufficient meds with me), so I didn't have the energy to explore anymore. I'm glad Sam and Bria are such good sports and didn't mind calling it a day early in the afternoon.

We broke up the drive home with a pit stop at the outlet malls 20 minutes south of home for a little shopping and some dinner. The perfect way to wrap up an awesome weekend.

Oh, hello.

I should probably apologize to my mother-in-law for not posting since New Years (!) because I know she loves these updates. So here's a slew of pictures of the darling B. I'm not promising, but I'll try to post some more specific updates soon.

The most notable update is that Bria began preschool in January.

Since the summer, when Bria gave up her nap and moved to a big-girl bed, she decided staying in her bed all night was overrated. This became quite the ordeal until finally a big fat bribe of a nightlight did the trick. Many times we'd find her hanging out in her doorway, playing with toys, half asleep, or fully asleep. This night was particularly cute, even if frustrating.

She's still killin' it with her facial expressions.

The weather this winter has been incredible. Several 70 degree days and more park days than during the summer.

I just hope it's obvious she dresses herself.

Even with the warm weather, we still get our rain and chilly days. One Saturday we ventured to Sprinkles for cupcakes. Bria was just thrilled to use her umbrella.

Bria's favorite activity is drawing. Her doodles and pictures fill all our notebooks, receipts, scraps, envelopes-- everything. Here's a self-portrait of Bria as Rapunzel on the magnadoodle. 

She's still expressing herself through dress-up. And, yes, that is my sports bra as some kind of singlet. 

She also does her own hair some days. (We also rejoined Costco, which is very noteworthy. We just couldn't stay away.)

Bria hadn't been to the doctor in . . . a while. So she had a check-up and caught up on some shots. She was a total champ! She stayed calm and happy the whole time until the nurse walked out the door, and then her little chin began to quiver and she burst into tears. Poor girl.  

She loves to use her princess headphones she got at Christmas. The best is when she shouts at me while listening to music. "I CAN'T HEAR YOU MOM, BECAUSE THE MUSIC IS IN MY EARS." (That's a real, direct quote.)

 Yesterday was another one of those 70-degree days. So amazing! We spent the entire afternoon at gravely point watching the planes take off. Bria also kept trying to get the seagulls to fly over and land on her finger. She could not understand why none of the birds were willing.

Merry Mangum Christmas 2011

As promised, here is our annual Christmas video. And lest you think it's late, you can read about the seasonal appropriateness of the topic here. (Nerd alert?)

Merry Christmas and very happy new year to all our friends and family!

Joyeux Noel

An unfortunately blurry picture of Christmas morning, before heading out to see our loot.

I have come to love and cherish our small quiet Christmases at home, just the three of us. Creating a world of Christmas magic for Bria is thrilling and just gets more and more exciting every year. (Though I feel conflicted about the whole Santa business, I found myself making all sorts of Santa-related threats in the days leading up to Christmas and then feeling all sorts of guilty late at night about it. Apparently Santa brings out the worst in my parenting skills. But that's a topic for another day.)
Uhh . . . so, back to the magic of Christmas?


After a wild party the night before, Bria slept in! Talk about a Christmas miracle. Here she is in all her excited-to-see-what-Santa-brought glory.

Bria asked for two things for Christmas: a princess tea set and a unicorn pillow pet. (Actually, there were a couple days she asked for a princess iPad, but I was quick to inform her Santa was incapable of delivering on that wish.)

Needless to say, joy abounded.

Santa was also informed of Bria's deep and abiding love of nail polish. Oh, that Santa is so crafty.

With 1:00 church we had plenty of time to enjoy a lazy morning basking in the glow of giving and receiving and indulging in a tasty brunch. After a calm afternoon of thousands of tea parties, we headed to Marc and Jenn's house for dinner and general family togetherness until way too late at night. All in all, a wonderful and magical Christmas.

Festivities

Even though Bria and I skipped town for 8 days just before Christmas, we still packed in a lot of holiday fun as a family.

Bria and I found this tiny tree to squish into our tiny apartment. It was my first real tree ever, and I absolutely love it.

We filmed our annual Mangum Family Christmas Video over 5 different shooting sessions. (We'll post it here as soon as it's edited.)

We spent Thanksgiving weekend at the mall making a major dent in our Christmas shopping. Bria is an excellent shopping companion, and is always eager to model various accessories.

We went to a delicious hibachi grill for my work party, which included Christmas crackers and these paper crowns.

Bria and Sam decorated a giant gingerbread man on Christmas eve so I could focus on cooking up a delicious meal to eat with our friends Mandy and Trent.

Pre-Christmas Utah Trip

The week before Christmas, Bria and I made a trip out to Utah to visit my family. I even convinced my oldest sister to drive out from CA at the same time, so almost my entire family was there. (We were only missing my brother, whose wife was 9 months pregnant. Baby Boy arrived two days ago!) We had eight days packed full of cousins, friends, snow, food, and pre-Christmas fun.
I think visiting before Christmas is the way to go. We got to do so many holiday things and open presents with my parents while still getting to have our own family Christmas at home. Seriously, three cheers for this plan.

 

Bria loved trying to catch snowflakes on her tongue.

 

I remembered my wedding dress was in the guest room closet, so I pulled it out for Bria to see, and she tried on my veil.

We ate out almost every day, hitting up all my fave SLC eateries. Blue Plate Diner for brunch was a necessity.

I channeled my inner crafty Mormon and spent most of my downtime on my mom's 39 year-old sewing machine. She bought it straight out of high school, and it's still going strong (on the original light bulb!).

My sisters and I spent many late nights laughing, including playing with the Christmas decor from our childhood.

When my mom realized all four of her daughters would be at church with her, she roped us into singing. Since my mom and brother-in-law were the only ones sitting in the pews with the 8 children while we sang, Bria and her same-aged cousin Abby got to come up to the stand and sit on my dad's lap while we sang (he's in the bishopric). I think it was the highlight of our trip for my dad.

We celebrated Christmas together, including my mom's traditional reading of The Polar Express.

We do an individual gift exchange among all the siblings and cousins, drawing one name. My sister Whitney gave to Bria and wisely chose princess headphones. This girl couldn't contain her joy.

There were a lot of moments like these between Bria and all of her cousins. She absolutely adores and idolizes her many, many cousins.

I met my niece Chloe! Having to wait 6 months to meet my niece is one of the worst things about living far away.

Our last night we went to see the lights at Temple Square. Bria was rather confused why we weren't going inside the temple.

She settled for some quality cousin bonding time in the stroller.

And, as always, Bria was a champ on the flights. I think I calculated that these were her 29th and 30th flights? That girl is a pro.