And she's down....

I've been a blog slacker lately.  I have so much to catch up on, but here is a quick preview of our little girl Eva.  She is now 21 months old!  The girl never stops moving...which also means she is constantly falling.  Love this slide-show of pictures, check it out:

 The East German judge gave her a 10 for the dismount.



Check out this goof (she is her father's child 100%):

Homemade Christmas Gifts

 I can't wait until the day I have money and can just go out and buy gifts for people!  I'm sure my family can't wait until that day as well!  Until then we make due by making most of our gifts for family.  And hey, I can't lie, even though it is more stressful and time-consuming, I enjoy doing it.  A special thanks to a few sisters from my ward that gave me some free fabric to make a few of these projects possible!
Here are some of my homemade Christmas gifts, which are, as always, my design made without patterns:

Actually I made these two years ago when I was on "bed-rest" during Eva's pregnancy.  I just set up the sewing machine in my bed and sewed stockings for all of Aaron's family as well as our own.

Oven-mitt and coasters

Oven-mitt close-up

Coasters made with Mod Podge.  The pictures can be taken out and exchanged from the back.

Skirt and sweater for my little sister to wear on her mission.  She just got a call to Fresno, CA!  I made the skirt from scratch and added the flowers to the sweater I purchased.

Scripture-marking pencils for little sister to take on mission.

Scripture-marking pencil case opened.

OH! Can't take credit for this idea.  Check out my friend Shannon's craft blog.  She sites the web page she found the idea from.  I made FACE plates for all my family.  They are dishwasher safe!

Aaron's face plate close-up.

I also made place mats for my mother to match her Americana themed kitchen.  The utensils have there own pocket!  I found this idea in a book once upon a time but made my own version of it since I didn't have the pattern.

Place mat close-up. 

We didn't do Christmas cards this year but we still send our love to everyone.  Hope you all had a Merry Christmas!  We love and miss all of you.

The newest growth in Jodi's belly

 That's right!  We're expecting a baby BOY! 

If you didn't know, don't feel left out.  We haven't made the announcement until now.  

We are due in May.

"Beneath the clothes, we find a man... and beneath the man we find... his... nucleus."--Nacho Libre

BEFORE scrolling down to view the pictures, watch this video where Eva will tell you what she was this year for Halloween:

That's right, the Dahlins were the Nacho Libre clan this year.  Eva (yes, she is a girl) dressed up as Nacho, Aaron was Esqueleto (Nacho's trusty sidekick), and I was Sister Encarnacion (the nun).

Our costumes were a big hit!  Since they don't sell Nacho Libre costumes or patterns, I designed and handmade everything!  It paid off though.  We won the grand prize at Aaron's Medical School costume competition!  Winning grand prize meant that we walked away with 2 movie passes, a $25 restaurant gift card, and a free t-shirt!  Thanks guys for voting for us!  We also won best pair (Aaron and Eva) at our Church's Halloween contest.  That prize was a yummy apple pie.

So, needless to say, Halloween was a hoot this year.  It was the first time Eva has gone Trick-or-Treating, which was, of course, a big hit for her.  Check out all the fun we had this year:

Nacho "cheesing" up for a picture.  We are at the Halloween party put on by Aaron's school.

How do you like this smile?  Oh, and that isn't chocolate on her mouth, that is a mustache.

A lot of people asked if Eva was wearing a wig!  Nope, I used those fabulous foam curlers.  This is before.

This is after!

Our church Halloween party had a fun hayride for the children.  Eva loved this.

Trick-or-Treat!

More smiles.  Silly smiles.

Love this girl.

Here is the Halloween contest at Aaron's school.  We are on the right, if you don't recognize us.  I am wearing my full costumes here.  For some reason I didn't make it home with part of my costume :(  Lost and gone forever.

The darling Dahlin's

Fabulous Florida Fun

That's right! This summer Aaron, Eva, and I went to Florida with a few fabulous friends.
This is SUCH a great trip.  We loved every minute.
Being in the military we received super cheap Disney World 4 day passes and a free day at Sea World. We have these offered to us every year so give us a ring if you are ever interested in going to Disney Land or World for cheap! Also, the friends we went along with gave us the hook ups for dirt cheap flights and a time share! You could not go to Florida for cheaper! It was great!

Day 1 was spent at the beach. We had such a fabulous time playing in the water that this became our favorite day over all, despite the ridiculous amount of fun we had all week.


Day 2: Magic Kingdom. Heather made us all matching Mickey Mouse t-shirts for this day!  She also gave Eva a Tiger stuffed animal!  Thanks friends for taking care of us.

Day 3: Hollywood Studios


Day 4: Sea World


Day 5: Epcot


Day 6: Animal Kingdom

Day 7: oops! We missed our stand-by flight and stayed the night and next day in New York City.

What a fabulous vacation this was. I could go on and on and on about each day and all the fun we had, but you know what they say, a picture (or in this case many pictures) are worth a thousand words!

Thanks Riddles for making it possible!

Here are a few pictures from our trip:

At Cocoa Beach in Florida 

Aaron jumping in the waves

Daddy and Eva

Dahlin Family Feet

Daddy and Eva playing in the waves

Daddy and Eva

Daddy and Eva

Mommy looking funny

Dahlin Fam on the Beach

Sariah Riddle and Eva

The Riddle Family!

Day 2: Magic Kingdom.  On a boat to the front gates

We made it! Rain and all. Check out our fancy shirts.  Thanks Heather!

Ohhhh, cute.  Not a super photogenic family.

Buzz scaring Eva

Eva LOVING magic kingdom.

Daddy and Eva on the Teacups!  Eva's first official ride!

Hollywood Studios.  A few fabulous rides this day.  Not a lot of pictures.

Sea World!  This is after a
show with the dolphins.
Eva loved this show.
Sea World also had
the funnest roller-coasters!
This is a picture of the coaster
that had us sitting head first!
What a blast!

A sea world kid ride.  Lots of fun for Eva.

more pictures of the rides.

The fish merry-go-round at Sea World.  We rode this till the park closed.  Eva's favorite ride by far!

Epcot day!

The Epcot.

Eva sniffing flowers in England.

Daddy being goofy.

Animal Kingdom!  This was surprisingly a fun park with lots of fabulous rides!

A Safari ride in Animal Kingdom.  This is one of the ferocious animals we found.

NYC!

More of Time Square.

Central Park

A good-lookin guy I found in Central Park

The Time Share that we stayed at had a jet tub.  Eva's new favorite thing.