Shoes

Julie likes shoes. She has a particular taste in shoes, however. Every once in a while, we'll end up in a store that sells shoes. When this happens, she has a game that she likes to play. It's called "Make Keith Guess Which Shoes I Like And Which Shoes I Think Are Ugly." Not exactly the most exciting game. But I'm pretty good at it. She really likes heels, but they have to be just right.

Not too short, not too tall. Somewhere around the 3-4 inch range.


The heel itself has to be small, not a big fat thing.


She hates wedges.


She's not a fan of the platform that you often find in the front of a heel.


No weird patterns/designs.


And she prefers the shoe not to be too shiny (like plastic) or suede.


She also likes boots, but has yet to find a pair for herself. She claims that her "beefy calves" make it hard to find a good pair that fits.


If we had way too much money and she wasn't afraid of spending money on things, we would probably have a shoe museum. Sometimes, it's ok not to have a ton of excess money to throw around.

I love weddings. Drinks all around!

Keith and I are taking a break this weekend. And by "taking a break," I guess I just mean that we aren't going to any weddings haha.

The weekend of the 11th, we went to Denver. One of my best friends and roommates was getting married to another one of my best friends. These two were both in my freshman ward, and I had the opportunity to see their relationship develop from the very beginning. It took a little hiatus while he was on his mission of course, but we all knew they would be together again in the end. Don't you love when that happens?! :)

Then this past weekend, Keith and I got to go back home for my brother's wedding. My bro and his wife started dating November 2010, so they've been together for almost 2 years now. Their wedding and reception wasn't half as good as mine, but that's not really their fault. I'm just that much more fun than they are. :) Either way, it was SO incredibly fun to spend a week with my family. Man alive, we drive each other crazy sometimes, but it's always worth it for the fun times we have together.

That's really why I love weddings so much. It is the best possible excuse to get your closest family and friends together in the same place at the same time. The most memorable moment of my wedding day was when I walked into that sealing room and saw all of those people. Those smiling faces exuded such love, support, and overall happiness for me that I was completely overwhelmed. One year later, I still consider the time spent in that holy house the best of my life. :)

Here are just a few pictures from this past weekend. Their photographer did some really creative shots. Their wedding pictures are definitely going to be something to cherish. The whole album is fantastic and so funny! I wish the weather would have been nicer when Keith and I got married. Maybe then we would have spent more time taking pictures haha

The happy couple

Thought this was a neat idea

The whole clan being wacky... like usual

And just for old time's sake. Happiest day of my life :)

Entomophobia anyone??

"Whenever I hear you scream bloody murder, I assume it's just a bug."

Thanks Keith. Really. If ever something awful actually WERE to happen to me, my screams would be brushed off as if I'd merely seen an ant. Comforting.

It's not my fault that I have somehow become terrified of bugs. ALL bugs. Except ladybugs. I can handle those. But bugs in general give me the creeps. I hate them. I look at them and want to throw up. Or cry. Or run away screaming. Or all three. Which was the case today.

I was watching the Olympics, which is literally ALL I have done for the past week and a half. And for some reason, while I watch really intense athletes perform amazing feats, I like to sit on my couch and eat candy. No biggie. So tonight, I reach over, pick up my bag of sour patch kids (YUM), and see this HUGE bug on the bag. I don't even know what the thing was, just that it was big and black. I literally screamed at the top of my lungs and threw the bag to the floor, spewing its contents. I wonder what the neighbors were thinking?? They probably didn't jump to the conclusion that I had seen a bug... And as a side note, the candy bag was almost empty. Otherwise I never would have considered throwing it to the floor and contaminating that much sugary goodness. Anyway... I made a complete fool out of myself. Again. But then Keith, being the studly man he is, killed the bug for me. My hero.

Keith and I are lucky. Our apartment is really pretty clean for an old married complex in P-town. I've only ever seen like 3 bugs in our place, and we've lived here for a year now! Sometimes people try to convince me that bugs are good. That we need certain bugs to control the numbers of certain other bugs? (In my opinion, it would be great if NO bugs existed at all. Then they wouldn't have to try and keep track of each other all the time...?) But since they exist, and I can't do anything about it, I will accept it. I will NOT, however, accept bugs in my HOUSE. EVER. And ESPECIALLY not anywhere near my candy. If it ever happens again, Keith will end you quickly.

Let's play Candyland!

Yeah, that was one of the first things my brother said to me when he came to visit this past week. And I can't complain! Somehow, my family (though the youngest of us is almost 14) has come to love that game more and more with age. Don't ask. It's the same with the game Sorry. Man alive if you want to see my family competitive, get us all together for a game of Sorry.

I absolutely love my family. I am so glad that my baby brother and daddy could come out to Utah to visit last week. I had so much fun with them. We talked and laughed. A LOT. I got to show my brother around campus and convince him even more that he wants to come to school here at BYU. We saw the new Spiderman movie (which was pretty good) went out to eat a few times, and daddy even bought our groceries for the week! Hooray!

We also got to spend some time with my cousins! Which I don't do very often, unfortunately. My cousins are AWESOME! They are just like the rest of us who live on the East Coast. We have the same sense of humor and even the same mannerisms. I'm so sad we didn't grow up closer together. Anyway, we spent July 4th and 8th with them and had a TON of fun. We played 2 games of whiffleball which was a blast! Except for when Keith hit the ball into my 10-year old cousin's face... Actually, that was hilarious. We all just laughed, it looked so dang funny. Hit her square in the forehead, and then that ball flew straight up like ten feet in the air. She laughed too haha. When you grow up the youngest of 5 brutal siblings, you get used to it. At least it wasn't a real baseball. :)

I'm not much of a picture taker, so I don't have any proof of the fun I had with them, but believe me when I say I absolutely LOVE my family. I wouldn't trade any of them for the world. I can't wait to go back home and visit everyone (minus Josh) next month for my older brother's wedding. YAY!

Random thoughts

So, it's been a while since I've posted here. Julie is a bit better at it than I am.  Actually, there have been quite a few times that I've had something to say but never ended up posting. It's usually just because I'm too tired or too lazy. I'm sure that all of you already know that I transferred to a different department at Vivint a little over a month ago. I now work in the retention department, and I got a $2/hour raise, which was really nice! My schedule is now from 7-3:30 Monday-Friday. I'll work a Saturday every once in a while, but it isn't something that happens on a regular basis. As much as I love getting home so early, it really kind of stinks when my alarm goes off at 6 in the morning. I've never been very good about getting to bed on time, which doesn't help things. For the first few weeks after transferring over, I was feeling completely overwhelmed with all of the work that we had to do, but things are looking up now.

We had the opportunity to pick Joseph up from the airport last week and take him to the MTC. That was such a great experience! It was so much fun to spend some time with him! And when I think about it, we aren't going to be all that far. I just realized that when we go down to Garry and Sheri's for the baby blessing at the end of the month, Joseph will already be in the field. We'll be driving right through his mission on the way down. Random. Anyway. We were supposed to pick Joseph up from the airport at 11:45. Being the really intelligent person that I am, I didn't even think to check his flight status before we left for the airport. When Julie and I got there, we checked the flight board and saw that his flight had been delayed until after 2:00. We had enough time that we could have easily gone home and come back to the airport later. Instead of wasting that much gas though, we decided to just head over to the City Creek Center to waste some time. While we were at Macy's looking at clothes, we got a call from Joesph. The reason his flight was delayed was because of storms from where the flight originated. Once the plane actually got to Texas, Joseph boarded and sat for a while. But at some point, a bird flew into the engine. Yeah, that's really helpful. They said they were going to check it out but that they should be ok. However, after sitting on the plane for about an hour, they had to get off the plane. Apparently it wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Luckily, Joseph ran into some other missionaries. Some were going home, and there was one who was also headed to the MTC. They finally found a plane and Joesph ended up getting into Salt Lake at about 6, only 6 hours after he was supposed to. We took him and the other stranded Elder (the shuttle he had arranged to pick him up was long gone) out to dinner and got them into the MTC a little after 8.

Um... I went to change our laundry, and my train of thought got derailed...  I hope you enjoyed my disjointed thoughts. :-D

Carpet Cleaning

We got our carpets cleaned today. I absolutely HATE getting our carpets cleaned, and here are my reasons why...

1) Is it really necessary to clean the carpet three times a year?! They're just stealing our money. We HAVE to have them cleaned when the complex schedules the cleanings, and they automatically add the charge to our monthly rent bill. Yuck. More needlessly spent money. I keep a clean house... and I KNOW I didn't dirty my carpet that much over the last semester...

2) Those guys are in and out of here within 10 minutes. How is that a bad thing you might ask? Not gonna lie, it's not like I want people tramping around my house for hours and hours, but heck, if you're going to claim to "clean the carpets," you had better CLEAN THE CARPETS! And honestly, I doubt you can legitimately clean an entire apartment's worth of carpet in 10 minutes, even though our apartment is small and the carpet wasn't all that dirty to begin with.

3) WET SOCKS! UGH! I hate having wet socks! Or wet feet! Or wet shoes even! The ventilation in our place isn't all that great, and that stuff they spray doesn't dry too quickly. They came in for 10 minutes, but we'll have uncomfortably wet floors for the next day and a half. Fantastic...

I have to admit though, there is one (and only one) good thing about getting your carpets cleaned. Your floors have to be clear, and vacuumed. I ALWAYS keep my house neat and clean. In fact, my friends get ticked off if they hear me call my place a mess. However, when we get our carpets cleaned, my house is extra, EXTRA squeaky clean. And I love me some clean house. :)

Graduation!

So I am officially a graduate of Brigham Young University. Most people would be excited to graduate, stop going to school, doing busy work, jumping through hoops, etc. I, on the other hand, wouldn't mind freezing time and staying at this school forever. By FAR, these past four years have been the best of my life, and I wouldn't change a thing even if I could.

So now in order to keep myself from getting all mushy... I'll talk about my MOM!!! She came out for my graduation, and I had a blast with her! She got here late Monday night the 16th, and she left the next Monday. We were exhausted all week, we did so much running around and visiting and partying. After I actually walked early Friday morning, she, Keith, and I headed up to Idaho for the weekend. I have a lot of family that lives up there, mostly second cousins. And I don't know any of them haha. It was great going up there and actually getting to know these family members I had previously only heard the names of.

One of my favorite parts of the weekend was that I went shooting!!! It can't be a proper Idaho experience if you don't mess around with some guns right?? So the husband of one of my cousins took Keith and I out to the middle of nowhere (which isn't hard to find in Idaho) and we got out some clay pigeons. First he taught us how to throw them. That was absolutely hysterical; my first few tries were horrendous, and I almost collapsed from how hard I was laughing... multiple times. Trying to pull that thing left handed was the best. So then my cousin takes out 3 shotguns and all these ammo boxes... but they were all empty! What the?! He didn't have any ammo for the shotguns he brought with him. So instead he gave me his handgun, and I got to shoot that. We just propped up some clays so I had something to aim at. It was still so fun. I've never shot a gun before, and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. Maybe it was that I was doing something new, or something dangerous, but I really enjoyed it! Which doesn't make any sense because I'm truly terrified of guns? Maybe not as much as I thought. :)

Anywho, I loved spending time with my hilarious mother and seeing once again how insanely similar we are. And I'm glad that Keith got to meet more of my extended family as well. We had a great time.

These are my elementary education girls! We made it through two years together!

This is me and one of my besties M. We've been through a lot haha.

 

Of course Keith and I had to take a picture together...

 which was reminiscent of this one taken last year, still one of my favorites :)

This is my mom's cousin... the one who owns all the guns.
This is his gun safe... bigger than a refrigerator, currently holding at least 30 guns.

Hoppy Easter!!! heh heh...

One of the best things about the first year of marriage is starting new traditions. I have always enjoyed Easter. And no, it's not just because of all the candy.  Easter is a great time of year. Spring has started and everything is coming back to life. Coincidence that the holiday celebrating the Resurrection of our Savior falls at this time? I think not.

Anyway, as of yet, we don't really have a ton of traditions, but we did do a few things for Easter today. First of all, we actually had TIME to do some fun things, considering it was the first Sunday in a while that Julie didn't have to spend the entire evening planning lessons for the upcoming week. The first thing we did was color eggs. We boiled a dozen and got the dye ready, but by the time everything was set up, it was time to go to church.  When we got home, we decorated our 6 eggs each. The egg-dying kit we got had a magic crayon that you could use to make designs and whatnot.  I'll tell you what, it's rather difficult to draw something without it looking ridiculous or just plain creepy when you're (1) using a clear crayon, (2) drawing on an egg, and (3) can't really draw in the first place.  We'll just say that the Easter bunny I attempted looked more like a Halloween bunny...  Most of the eggs actually turned out pretty well though!  See!

All of the eggs:

Julie's eggs:

My eggs:

After we colored the eggs, we made a bunny cake!

Julie's family would make a bunny cake every Easter. We thought it was a good idea as well. I mean really, any excuse to make a cake is a good idea. We basically made two round cakes and cut the ears out of one to make the bow tie (don't judge if it looks more like a shirt than bow tie). We shared the cake with Julie's old roommate and her husband. It was a lot of fun to spend some time with them.

Also, Julie likes to make sure that my posts are worthy to go on the blog. She makes sure to edit them and take out any random rambling that I may do. Which in some cases means she almost rewrites the entire post. I love you babe!

A Car!

We got a car!  Yes indeed.  We bought a car.  We found a 2007 Suzuki Forenza for $5400.  It has about 68,000 miles on it and a little bit of damage to the fender, but it's still in pretty good shape. We feel like it was a really great deal. Man alive. Can't tell you how exciting it is to actually say that we own a car now. Can't wait to put it to use!

General Conference

I love conference, and I mean LOVE it.

And every six months I am blown away, once again, at how much I love it. Which is honestly a weird thought. Not gonna lie, it's hard for me to watch conference. If you know me, you know I have a TERRIBLE time sitting through hours of television or watching movies. I usually fall asleep. And if that isn't the case, it's always the opposite. I go crazy if confined for too long! What makes it even better is that I have the privilege of watching it alone... I HATE being alone. Curse Keith's work schedule...

At any rate, in the midst of my intermittent napping, the drifting of my easily distracted mind, and my inability to sit in the same position for more than a few minutes at a time, I find myself in tears by the end of a session. Though I usually have to reread all of the talks at a later date to get anything out of them, one thing has always been consistently clear. The men and women that speak to us are prophets and apostles of God. Their messages are inspired and crucial to our happiness. I know that if we want to feel honest joy in this life, it is my responsibility to take heed to their council.

Rarely do I feel as humble, gracious, charitable, and grateful as I do at conference time. It is then that my eyes are opened once again to the many blessings I have received in the beautiful life that I live. I have a testimony that those blessings come because of the choices I make and the people I spend my time with. I love the Lord and everything He does for me. I know that even though He has billions of things to worry about, I am still one of His first priorities, and He truly concerns Himself with my happiness and welfare.

For some reason, these confirmations of my faith cause me to be a bit emotional. (Me?! emotional?!) Conference weekend and I have a love/hate relationship like that. I've been sporadically crying for like, the last five hours... In any case, I would rather be filled with these overwhelming feelings of gratitude, peace, and joy than not. The first two sessions of this, the 182nd General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, have been uplifting, enlightening, and profound. I encourage everyone to listen to these inspired saints.

Here is the link to happiness, peace, and love. Enjoy. :)

I rock. The end.

Yeah, I'm a good teacher, and I'm going to brag about it. :)

My mentor teacher wasn't at school again today because she was at home taking care of her sweet husband. The poor guy is finishing his last week of radiation/chemo. He is so adorable, and I really admire his determination, but sometimes it's just too much for him.

I had a substitute in the classroom with me today. (Even though I solo teach for the entire day, I still technically need a substitute in the room with me because I'm not officially certified yet. So they get paid for doing nothing while I do all the work. Lame, but that's just the way it is.)

Anyway, apparently this lady is a retired superintendent. She has been the principal of an elementary school, a middle school, and a high school. And of course before that, she was actually an elementary school teacher for many years.

This lady had the opportunity to observe me all day today. At the end of the day, she wrote a VERY nice letter about me and my abilities to my mentor teacher. She gave me one of her cards and told me that she would be more than willing to write me a recommendation. She even talked to my school's facilitator over lunch and told her that she should hire me for next year!!! Hahaha, that part made me laugh, but hey, I'm not going to complain! She told me that I was one of the best student teachers that she had ever seen. Not only do I have an excellent grasp of the content knowledge, but I know how to deliver it effectively while properly managing a classroom of 30 rambunctious 7-year olds.

It may just be me, but I feel like after hearing all of that from a former teacher, principal, and superintendent, I deserve to boast about it. And treat myself to a nice snack later on tonight. :) Maybe some ice cream? Or cookies? Either way... yay me!

Talking in her Sleep

As you all know, we don't have kids, and we are both really busy with school and work. With few exciting things going on, it's hard to remember to update the blog on a regular basis. We have done a few fun things this week, and Nancyann is going to be coming out one week from today! Not that we're at all excited for this, nor have we been looking forward to this for who knows how long.... right.

Anyway, as we finished watching tv tonight, I tried to wake Julie up so we could go to bed. She told me she would prefer to sleep on the couch. (If I do let her sleep all night on the couch, I'm pretty sure she won't be happy in the morning. But when you're asleep, all you care about is staying that way). So I figured I'd check facebook and do a few other things on the computer before I try to wake her up again to bring her to bed. I'm sitting here on the computer, minding my own business when Julie asks me, "Did you get it lower?".....Uh... what? She has a tendency to talk in her sleep. Just a few sentences, never much more than that, and I am never able to get a conversation going. It's too bad. I think it would be quite entertaining. I'm really curious as to what inspired this one from a few weeks ago, "I think his latest would have been for Kyle probably..." followed by her chuckling a few times.... I have NO idea how to interpret that one! Oh, and the other night she started humming in her sleep. That's a new one. It was just a few notes, but it was definitely humming and not just some random noise. Perhaps if she has some more great ones I'll share them in the future. Well, it's late. I think I'm going to go try to convince her to get off the couch to go to bed again...

*As a side note, all of my friends tell me that I take too long to tell stories... I wonder why in the world anyone would ever think that I was long-winded? Where would I get that from?

I prefer it awkward?

Okay, we are LONG overdue for an update.

Last Friday while I was at school, I checked my phone during my lunch break. One of my old roommates texted me and mentioned that BYU was having their preference dances that weekend. They were going to get tickets for that night and wondered if Keith and I wanted to go as well. That text was a freakin dream come true! I had just talked to one of my other old roommates about how Keith and I haven't gotten out of our house in so long. I specifically mentioned how awesome it would be if we could just get to one of those lame on campus parties. TA DA!

So Keith and I, two of my old roommates, and their cute boys all went to preference last Friday night. We showed up to the ballroom... and it was an incredibly anticlimactic sight. The place was empty... like COMPLETELY empty. I have never seen such poor attendance at a BYU dance, ESPECIALLY a preference dance! Those things are always packed! On the bright side, we actually had enough room to dance. The other thing that made this dance so awkward was that all of the lights were on... Yeah... who actually dances when all of the lights are on?! No one. Even those of us who enjoy dancing feel a bit self conscious in the light.

But though the conditions were poor, we still had a ton of fun. First of all, the company was great. I absolutely LOVE my friends. Their presence can make anything enjoyable. Also, there was a triangle pair there. Triangle meaning, that those two definitely belong together. Maybe I'll explain that analogy in more detail later. Anyway, watching them dance made the entire night worthwhile. SO FREAKIN HILARIOUS. Some people (like myself) hide their horrendous dancing from the rest of the world. Luckily though, others don't, which provides those people like me with some fantastically awesome entertainment.

Keith and I also had some fun with our friends in a photo booth! I swear I haven't seen one of those since I worked at the mall back home. I forgot how fun they could be! We stuffed all six of us in there and took some wonderful pictures. Too bad Keith and I didn't get to keep any of those ones. Then of course, each couple had to take their turn in there alone. Pretty sure that my roommates did some pretty scandalous things in there haha. Anyway, I really like the pictures that Keith and I took. I just think they all turned out really well. Maybe it was because we actually went out and tried to look decent for once! That usually helps. Anyway, enjoy!

And does anyone think it odd how similar we look?? We definitely look related... and not just by marriage!