birthday

I love to look back over the past year at New Years and see all the blessings that have unfolded during that year. I can never just pick one highlight of each month so sorry there are multiple pictures for some months!

January- we started 2013 at the Rose Parade and Rose Bowl. It was so much fun and something we will always remember! We also went to Kauai with the Warrens!

February-we added sweet little Leo to our family! He makes us smile and laugh every day.

March- Rachel got her Mission call to Spain! Mark and I celebrated our 24th birthdays and lots of other family birthdays.

April- we got to go to the temple with Rachel, it was a great experience. I love my family 🙂

May- we got to meet our newest niece Coraline! Taylor turned sweet 16!

June- our family said goodbye to middle school and went to Courtney’s promotion.

July- this was a busy month for our family. My mom, Rachel and me went to southern California for my cousin Natasha’s wedding. While we were there we hit up Disneyland. It was a blast! We then said goodbye to Rachel for 18 months and our family headed to Utah for a Barker family reunion. It was great to be with family and especially my 99 year old great-grandfather! While there I got to catch up with my favorite roommates and their husbands! It was definitely a highlight of the year.

August- Mark and I celebrated our 3rd anniversary with a getaway to beautiful Jenner, CA. Mark is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I’m so blessed to share my life with this cute boy.

September- I went shooting with my little sister Courtney.

October- We were very fortunate to get to go to Hawaii for a 2nd time this year! This time we went to Oahu. I got to check paddle boarding off my bucket list, I loved it! We also threw a Murder Mystery Halloween party.

November- we celebrated my wonderful dad’s 50th birthday!

December- it has been a very busy month for us, per usual. We started the month off by going down to southern California for our niece Belle’s baptism. We obviously couldn’t pass up an opportunity to go Disneyland and see the Christmas Decorations. It was the BEST!

We also got to spend LOTS of time with family.

My dad took us to the Fight Hunger Bowl at AT&T Park to watch BYU & Washington State. We love going and especially love the perks of my dad’s job! Thanks Dad!

December was a tough month for our little kitty. He turned 1 this month! We had to take him to the vet a couple of times and also thought we were going to have to put him down a couple of time. It was emotionally exhausting but we are happy we get to have him longer. Hopefully 2014 is a little easier on him.

2013 was a good year, we were so blessed to have the opportunity to go to Hawaii twice, adopt Leo, send off the cutest little missionary, and spend lots of time with family and friends. I’m so grateful for everyone in my life. I’m excited to see what 2014 holds! Happy New Year!

Yesterday was our best friend Chris Murray’s birthday! He and Mark have been best friends practically since the day they were born. Chris use to call Mark “Marky Lauren” and Mark called Chris “Chriffafer.” They both have come a long way since then!

I was privileged to meet Chris pretty much the day I got to Rexburg in the fall of 2007. Mark and Chris were roommates and we became fast friends. Chris has always reminded me of the big brother I never had. He is hands down the most thoughtful and considerate person I have ever met. I remember our first Thanksgiving break I was going down to Utah. I think Mark had already left to go home to Utah and Chris called me just as I was about to get in the car and leave. He showed up in my parking lot with a bag of treats for the drive! Seriously, how thoughtful!

I just can’t say enough good things about this guy.

Last night we threw Chris a surprise birthday party at Craigos! We told him that we were going to take him and Rachel on a double date with us. While we picked up Rachel everyone met at Craigos, thanks to Kyle for rounding up the troops! It was a great surprise.

After dinner Mark and Chris had a flag football game so a bunch of us girls went to support Gandolfs’ army (that’s their team name…aka crogermad, that’s all their names put together, chris, logan, eric, mark, chad)

Every time they would score a touchdown or do something cool we would all scream “happy birthday Chris,” I think they were really embarrassed, but it was fun.

Anyways, thanks to all who came for Chris’s birthday.

Love you Chriffafer!

P.S. I know it looks like there were only 5 of us there but I didn’t even think about pulling out my camera until after everyone had already left 😦 There were probably about 20 ppl there!