2014 - The Year Of . . .

This year started off busy. 'Twas not for lack of a theme, however!

After a fun New Year's Eve with The Joyner's full of games I'd never heard of and delicious snacks (and an attempt at watching Groundhog Day, which I barely stayed awake for)

 We made it to MIDNIGHT!

No official pictures were taken of the ringing in of the New Year seeing as I was too tired.

On the 5 minute drive home, Jon could hardly wait to hear what the theme for 2014 was!

I happily announced that this year was to be

The Year of SATURDAYS

The rules are as follows:

Every Saturday of the year, we must do SOMETHING.

It doesn't have to be new. It doesn't have to be different. It doesn't have to be BIG. It just has to be something that involves us going on a date, or spending time together as a little family, but it has to be pre-planned, and it can't be something that we would have done already... like laundry.

Basically we always find ourselves in ruts - realizing that we haven't been on a date in months, or haven't really done anything noteworthy the whole week. Movies pass us by in the theaters that we always intended on seeing, and FHE just isn't a solid habit yet (although the quilt we have been working on for ages will hopefully motivate us to get some good use out of it!)

This year's theme is a reminder to help us TAKE TIME for each other and really make every week count. It's also an extension from last year (The Year of Exploration) so that we can continue to try new things and complete projects :)

Saturday 1 of this month, we went out to lunch at Claim Jumper with Summer and Riley. They are expecting their first baby (a girl!) just shortly after our baby Olivander, so we were really excited to see them before they headed back to Utah from Christmas break. We forgot to take a picture with them since we were on a rush out to this ADORABLE maternity photo session with Tadd and Kelly who are expecting their first baby (a surprise!) just 2 weeks ahead of us.

 

Proof of our lunch date with Summer and Riley will be forever documented in our new blog header for the year (pictured above!) in the center square. The "R" is from the Claim Jumper sign. Summer and Riley were the first to hear about our new theme and helped us jump start this blog header idea :)

Saturday 2 of this month, we went out to a new place for breakfast. I had actually been there before, but Jon had not. It's not "new" per se, but it was new for us. Country Gables Cafe had been voted best breakfast in Roseville, and my first time there I loved it! Unfortunately the second time there was not as great... and Jon was disappointed. Once again we forgot to take pictures - but I did get a snap of my leftovers ;)  Biscuits and Gravy with Country Potatoes. mmmm

Saturday 3 of this month was QUILT DAY! Some of you may have seen me post a little bit about it on Instagram.  

We were able to get the final pieces of fabric at Beverly's and made sure EVERYTHING was cut and sorted. Our ambitious log cabin pattern is a 17 piece block creating a 36 block quilt. We even finally started sewing it together this week! Right now the blocks look like this:

I can't wait to see it all come together!

The 4th Saturday of this month has a plan - which will be blogged about separately :)

One of the reasons I am really excited for this year's theme is because we will get to put our DATE PASSPORT to good use!

 You may remember when I gave it to Jon for Christmas.

(near the end of this very long post about 2013)

We have since completed about 4 dates in the book!
 Sometimes with friends, sometimes on our own. So far totally awesome.

 It's been a good way for us to keep track of things we want to do, movies we want to see, and we can write a little bit about it afterwards! I'm especially glad that at the end of the year it will be a book of memories where we can look back and see all of the cool things we got to do. It's sort of like an interactive journal! It might also be fun 10 years from now to remember what was in theaters and see how our tastes might have changed.

Already we are thinking of new things to do each week, all the time! Going to the zoo, taking a day trip to San Francisco, exploring the redwoods of Humboldt, taking Kate to the beach for the first time - these are all things that we'll be attempting as we Saturday our way through 2014 :)

2014 is starting off to be pretty good!

We hope that you'll enjoy following the adventures of The Alston Family.