Christmas Trees in River Heights

We love our new home, our new neighborhood, and our new community! A few weeks ago, River Heights had their annual tree lighting in the park right across the street. So we bundled ourselves up nicely, and walked across the street to join in with the singing and lighting of the tree. There's something magical about singing Christmas carols in the freezing cold and looking at the beautiful lights. Afterwards, we wandered over the the city building for some doughnuts, hot chocolate, and SANTA!!

Now, Savana saw Santa one Saturday at Walmart and screamed like crazy when I tried to put her on hit lap. She kept telling me later about how Santa was a bad guy...so I've spent the last few weeks convincing her that Santa is a nice guy. She still took a bit of convincing that night to sit on Santa's lap, but once on she couldn't stop cheesing for the camera!! And she also loves the candy that comes from sitting on his lap!

Gingerbread Houses

We invited the other Stroman's over for some gingerbread house making. The girls enjoyed sticking their hands in every bowl of candy, then pouring the bowls of candy on the ground and watching all the little candy pieces roll under the furniture. Savy loved eating the frosting, and I could barely put it on before she would stick her little finger out and swipe off the frosting. (The next day, while I was showering, she even proceeded to take off the candy pieces, lick the frosting off of them and off of the house, and then try to put the candy pieces back on.) Sam and Andy enjoyed making the same jokes while building the houses, and we all enjoyed the gingerbread masterpieces after they were completed. It was a great night...and a great way to celebrate Christmas.



And here is our princess Beyonce. (She even has a ring on it). And right now, she is sitting in our front yard, slowly tipping towards the sidewalk. ( I think she had a bit too much eggnog!)

Snow

Winter is here. Snow is on the ground. And every second Savy gets, she runs right into the snow...and then proceeds to eat the snow off her shoes while I'm trying to strap her into her carseat! (What is it with kids and eating snow? It's something instinctive they do...no one has to show them how it's done...they just do it!) We haven't yet had a chance to go out and play in the snow, but last night's dumping provided some great, fluffy, beautiful snow to play in...so we may have to venture outside later today.

My Christmas tree finally came, so now I can decorate it...and then I'll have to snap some pictures of our house for everyone to see our comfy, cozy home. (Or you can all just come and visit us!) The joys of owning an actual home come with some great things, and some not so great things. One of those things (I can't decide yet if it's a great thing, or a not so great thing cause I'm still enjoying doing it) is shoveling the walks. This morning while I was out shoveling my walks, my neighbor's son-in-law came to shovel her walks...and I realized it was my philosophy professor I had years ago! So I reintroduced myself (he said he remembered my name), and we proceeded to shovel walks side by side! It was quite interesting doing such a mundane thing with someone who has such a brilliant mind and such intriguing thoughts! Oh, and my storytelling professor from years ago is also in our ward! It's great being in a college town!!

Anywho...I'm loving the snow...for the moment...we'll see how I feel in another four months when there's still snow on the ground!!

We Are Finally HERE!!!!

Hooray!!! Dexter is thrilled to be in our new home...and so is the rest of the family!! (oh, how i love that smile). Condo is empty, clean, and sold. New home is cluttered, clean, and cold. (Logan has quite the chill in the air). I have spent the last 10 days cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, and cleaning some more. And there's still the whole downstairs I haven't gotten to. (Oh, well, that'll come in it's own due time.)

The saddest part about leaving Saratoga (besides leaving our family and friends), was leaving this beautiful piece of art behind. Thanks to all who came to help us move out and move in.

Savy loves her new home, and loves sharing a room with her brother. She's sad to see her dad leave for work ever morning (again!?!), but she loves having him home for lunch. She wants to play at the park and frequently sneaks outside when my back is turned. She's sleeping through the night again (hooray), but spends a lot of time in time-out. She's talks about going to school every day with the kids and the boys and driving in her pink car that's down in Saratoga Springs! Her imagination is expanding so quickly, and it's fun to be pulled into her world everyday. I love being home with her...I just need a frequent re-boost of patience.

And this little guy is the happiest little guy! He is such an angel for me...when he's well fed and well rested...which is most of the day. (I gave him rice cereal for the first time, and this was the face he pulled. "What are you trying to shove in my mouth?" He's not sure what to think about it.) Dex is growing so fast and his sweet little personality is starting to show through. He loves his family, and we love trying to get him to laugh. His smile is the best thing to wake up to.

Needless to say...we are all adjusting quite well to our new home. We love Logan. We love our house. And we are anxious to have people come share in our experience up here in Logan!

Happy Halloween...

This is all you get. After sitting here for almost an hour trying multiple times to upload photos to my blog, this is all I have patience for. (does anyone else struggle with uploading photos). Needless to say...you all better be freaking excited this picture is here for you to see. Savy wore that same sad look anytime she was in her monkey costume, Dex could have cared less, and Ninja Amber kicked Rocker Sambo's boo-tay with her Samurai sword!! We had a great Halloween, and maybe some day I'll have the patience to sit down and share with everyone the creepy pictures from the rocking Halloween party my sister threw for our family the night before!!

Our New Home

Here she is. The future home of the Stromanians. Odd how it came into our lives. We found a park we absolutely adored one evening, so we decided to drive around the neighborhood to see if there were any houses for sale. And this one was. So next time we came to Logan to look for houses, we saw this one. Loved it, wanted it, but it was a bit outta our price range, so we dismissed it. Next time we came up, we saw it again, and loved it even more!! But at this time, someone else put in an offer. So we came home and tried to make the number add up so we could counteroffer. However, the owner had already accepted some money from the other buyers. So we sadly dismissed the house from our minds once more. And then a month later, the owner calls us to say the buyers had fallen through. So we traveled up to Logan the next day, looked closely at every little detail, and put in an offer. And now it's ours!! We are sooo excited. It has four bedrooms, two baths, original hardwood floors, newly remodeled kitchen and bathroom, one car garage, and it's across from the most fabulous park! We are absolutely thrilled!!

We Have a House!

After lots and lots and lots of trips up to Logan, we finally have a house!! It's not officially ours yet, but we have a verbal agreement...and we're keeping our fingers crossed that everything goes through okay!! Finding a house is sooo stressful. We wanted the perfect one, but after looking at a gazillion and one, we realized the perfect one wasn't out there, so we settled on one that's really close to perfect. It's weird how things worked out with this house...the Lord certainly works in mysterious ways...but we are soo glad to things are working out. Logan...here we come!!

oh, and to welcome us to Logan, we had a magnificent snow storm up there yesterday.