Thanksgiving

After months of nothing happening besides school and work, we were able to make it down to Vegas for Thanksgiving. It was wonderful to spend time with family and get away from work and school

Here is a picture of Fremont  Street which for those who don't know is the original strip located north of the current strip in Vegas. The entire ceiling is some type of tv and the street consists of a variety of shows.

We enjoyed some bball and football before coming home to cook. We cooked enough food to feed an entire army and it was all delicious.

Kylie and Ellie both patiently waited for the adults to finish cooking the food.

Ellie was not as patient waiting for Christmas decorations to be setup after Thanksgiving. She was eager to lend a helping hand.

We were also able to celebrate Nicole's birthday both in Vegas and when we got back to Provo. Kylie was in charge of candles. After the countless (way more than Nicole's age) candles were blown out, I think there was more wax on the cake than cake. It was the perfect conclusion to a wonderful weekend.

Here are a few videos for your viewing pleasure. The first is a video from Fremont Street and the second was the greatest show we saw all weekend. Ellie graced us with several minutes of singing and dancing. Yet another talented Bunker.

The Best Husband Ever!

I know Josh usually writes our posts- but this time I wanted all to know how amazing my husband is! Not too long ago Josh told me he loved me for 42 reasons! Well... I told him I wanted a list of all 42... written down! Shortly after Halloween I came out of our room and found this pumpkin. On it Josh had painted all the reasons he loved me! How sweet is he!!!!!!

It's a Boy!

So a few weeks ago, Nicole had an ultrasound and we found out we are having a boy (see picture 2 for proof). He is due on Feb 15th, 2013.

Here is a picture of his face. Well more of his skull than his face. The not seeing his nose thing is a little creepy but Halloween is approaching so it's fitting.

Told you. A Boy! To get a better idea of the orientation of the picture, imagine he is sitting on a glass table and you are looking up.

This next two pictures may be the best. This one looks like he is sucking his thumb. Look at those biceps. What a beast.

He is another great profile and this time you can see his nose and not just his skull.

   So in case you are wondering, we are still undecided about names although we have discussed several. Our policy is that we are not mentioning names we have discussed, not because we don't want people to know but because we don't want people to have opinions if they think the names are good or bad. We figure, once the baby is born we will tell the name and then you will have to like it  :)  We would like to hear your guesses or suggestions of names though so go ahead and post your ideas (and no Pederson we are not naming our child Moses).

Memories

 So one of the worst things about moving out is that we have a lack of random visitors. It was the greatest thing to take a break from whatever we were doing to entertain Kylie and Ellie. Ellie started announcing herself whenever she reached the top of the stairs. One of her favorites was raising her hand high above her head to wave to her welcoming party. She would do this even if nobody was around to immediately see it. On this particular occasion, she announced herself by blaring some short of tuning instrument.

Moved In

After

Ok. So finally we have had time to finish unpacking, mostly because Josh has just finished four block classes. Here are the after pictures of the apartment

 Living room (above)    Kitchen (below)

 Hallway (above)   Living Room (below)

Moving....AGAIN

So right before school started we moved into an apartment. We were lucky enough 

to get into the one apartment building that was in the same ward. Moving was 

crazy because it was Nicole's worst week as far as being sick because of the pregnancy 

goes and Josh worked over 50 hours that week. But we got it all done, with a little help. 

Thank you to everyone who contributed in some way to make our 

move easier. Ok we received a lot of help.

Before

Thanks to all the wonderful gifts we got at our wedding, 

we realized we had more kitchen stuff than we could fit in the kitchen

Living room

The apartment is a two bedroom. The above picture is our bedroom and the picture below is the babies bedroom. It will also serve as a storage room. FYI Nic's ultrasound is in a couple of weeks!

Reunion Round 2

After coming home from the cabin we went up to Sundance for the Rowe Reunion. The first night we went to an outdoor theater and watch 7 Brides for 7 Brothers. The weekend also featured a cupcake war. Below is Dave and Deb's rendition of when he momentarily lost is ring while jumping off the trestle at the cabin. The weekend also featured family skits, a hike up to Stewart Falls, and some amazing food. We want to thank the Mckinnons for allowing us all to spend the weekend at their cabin.

The Beginning of a Legacy

So in the Bunker family it has become customary to announce pregnancies at the cabin and so we were privileged to do the same. It is a great place for it because you automatically have the whole family together. Most of you already know now but Nic is pregnant. She is due Feb 18. We find out the gender around the end of Sept. Please leave a comment at the bottom of this post with your guess as to if it will be a boy or girl.

The Cabin- Where Dreams Become Reality

After Nic's graduation we headed up to the family cabin in Island Park near Yellowstone. This picture is of the front of the cabin with the porch which was completed last year. The cabin is quaint but is the perfect place to relax with family and to get away from the world.

On the first day we grabbed the canoes and headed down the river which originates from a sprin.g only a few hundred yards above the cabin and runs past the canyon and back into town. Our course takes about an hour or so and is the perfect way to relax and search for nearby Moosen in the Woodsen 

On Monday we headed into Yellowstone and enjoyed Old Faithful, ice cream, swimming in a place named Firehole, and searched for more animals. We didn't get pictures of Firehole but it is located near a hotspring so it is not unbearably cold. It consists of a flowing river with a calmer area where most of the swimming occurs but you can also hike upstream a bit and jump end where there is a stronger current which makes for a natural lazy river of sorts. The highlight was that Kylie was old enough to go down the "slide" with her floaties and she beamed with excitement.

This moose and her calf were seen near the cabin. We saw others on our trip down the river as well.

This Buffalo was laying by the road in the park.

Buffalo go wherever they please. The trip was wonderful. It was a sad day when we had to return. We enjoyed spending the week with those closest to us and being able to do things as family. It was the first of many trips to the cabin for us as a married couple and Josh's first period.

Graduation Part II

Nicole's graduation started a very busy week for us. A few weeks ago Ben graduation from high school but this time it was Nicole's turn as she graduated from Brigham Young University. Walking in August was wonderful because of the small numbers. The entire ceremony took only an hour and a half.

Nicole graduated with a Bachelors of Science Degree in Psychology and we are all very proud of her!

Office Space

This past week Josh had the opportunity to head down to Vegas to help Chris move his chiropractic office down the street to a new office. We all pitched in and painted and moved all the equipment from the old office to the new.   

It was a lot of hard work but well worth it. The new office looks great and will be a great upgrade for Chris.  It was really nice to be able to give back to Becky and Chris for all that they do for us.

Exam Room

Main Room

 Main hallway to Chris's office and the rest of the exam rooms

Bunker Reunion

During mid-July we had a Bunker reunion in Heber City. We rented out two homes, our was pretty large, complete with horses in the backyard and curiously decorated. It was decorated with (which one is not like the others) two bison heads, a stuffed black bear, trout, knight in shining armor, bear skins and fox skins. During the day we had activities such as pioneer games seen above for Pioneer Day. This is a picture of Nicole looking Hott at the archery event. It was probably close to 100 degrees on this day.

At the firing range it was like Father like Daughter.

The last day of the reunion was designated for picture taking.

The children may have listened to Chris's directions better than adults (there is hope for the next generation), but all the pictures got done and the reunion was pretty successful with minimal trips to the emergency room.

Happy Birthday

This week we threw a surprise birthday party for Becky after she specifically told us not to do 

anything for her birthday. Chris was the mastermind behind the party...

and everything turned out great. The food was amazing, the attendance was great especially with many of the Bunker side being in town anyway for the reunion that night, and Becky later admitted she was surprised that she loved the idea of a large party so much.

We all drowned in chocolate thanks to Costco

We didn't think about the fact of there being sprinklers in the banquet room but thankfully we were able to open the door quickly enough after singing Happy Birthday to avoid having the party washed out. Happy Birthday Becky! We love you. You are amazing. We'll start planning for the century birthday party now.

Graduation

In June we were lucky enough to head down to Vegas for Ben's graduation from high school. With all the things Ben has been through and to still have the drive to not only complete school but to do it with honors, he is the perfect example of perseverance. Congratulation Ben!

Making Memories

In May we found a deal with KOA that if you camped for a night you got the second for free so we choose to go to Bear Lake. The campground was one of the nicest KOA's there is with a heated pool, bouncing pillow, clean restrooms (a must), and even a kitchen area complete with stove tops and sinks. Here Nicole's car "Ares" is all loaded up and looking rugged. 

We were able to enjoy some time on the lake in a canoe. As you can see things started off slow... 

but we got the hang of it. 

We spent 10 mins chasing a beaver in the canoe which was like Christmas for Josh. He had trouble getting the beaver centered in the picture while the camera was zoomed in and while bobbing up and down on a canoe (Where is Chris when you need him?). Some other highlights included some amazing pizza, Josh's glorious sunburn, and "world famous" raspberry shakes. Apparently if you advertise something raspberry at Bear Lake it is required by law that you include the word "famous" in front of it. 

Day 2 and Beyond

After our reception we left for our honeymoon and spent the first two days in a cabin up at Sundance. We then left for New York City and were able to see most of the sights such as the Statue of Liberty, Carnegie Hall, China Town, Madison Square Garden, Central Park, and even saw Lion King on Broadway.

We know it's corny to get a picture taken in front of a LOVE statue on our honeymoon but we couldn't resist. The best part is that when we gave our camera to a man to take our picture and walked over to the statue, we turn around and he was gone. He reappeared 10 seconds later having pretended to steal our camera. Thankfully he was only interested in joking around with a couple of tourists. 

Here we are on top of Dome of the Rock with the Empire State Building in the background. New York City was huge and it turned out to be a great place to spend a honeymoon. We absolutely loved it there.