The Meadows Family

Playing catch up

2012-02-03T23:24:00.000-07:00

Long time no blogging.

I have been having too much fun reading everyone else's blogs and spending way too much time on Pinterest to blog. I want to be better at updating. Maybe that will be a 2012 goal.

Anyway, here's a rundown on the last few months of 2011. This post may get long and boring, so read at your own risk. :)

In August we went to Lake Powell with some of our fun friends in our ward. It was my first time there and it was amazing. I finally understand and know why people are so in love with that place. Not only is it so much fun to play in the warm water all day, but the scenery is absolutely gorgeous. I want to go back again and again and again.

Josh and I on the house boat. Oh how I miss that warm sunshine.

View from our beach.

The LP crew.

Hottest wakeboarder I've ever seen

Proof that I got up on a surf board. I did not grow up in a family that boats, so my skills are limited, but I sure love being out on the lake, even if I can't do much on the water.

Missing this so much right now.

Also in August we finally mounted our tv and got cable and DVR. HALLELUJAH. We did not have a tv set up for the first five months we lived in our house and we hadn't had cable the first two years of our marriage. Not that tv and cable are everything, but it's definitely nice to curl up on the couch and watch your favorite shows now and again. Plus the only way I can fold laundry without wanting to poke my eyes out is to fold while I watch a show I love. Now we finally have folded clothes...most of the time. My favorite folding movie is "Tangled." Can't get enough of that movie.

This fall I was put in the Young Women's in my ward. I started out as the Mia Maid adviser, but was just made the first counselor. I absolutely love my calling. It is definitely more time consuming, but I absolutely love and adore every young woman and leader. We have a small group of girls, but they are all amazing and beautiful. I feel so lucky to spend this time with them. They teach me so much.

This past year, I have become very grateful for health. I've had a few health issues and it has been a real wakeup call. I've always considered myself to be a fairly healthy person, and while most health problems just happen and are out of our control, stepping up the healthiness a notch never hurt anyone. Here's to a healthier 2012.

I have to brag for a second about my husband. He has been rocking his job. He works so hard in everything he does and I am forever grateful that he is mine.

We also decided to end 2011 by redoing our kitchen and full bathroom. It has been a crazy 7+ weeks(and still going strong) but so far, everything that's been done looks great. The bathroom is done and the kitchen is about 75% done. I long for the day to have a functioning, updated kitchen but I know it will be worth the wait. I'm just glad we're getting these big projects out of the way before kids come along. As soon as the kitchen is done, I will post lots of before and after pictures. I'll do a bathroom post soon. I am so happy with how it turned out. It looks 100x better. I'm obsessed.

Anyway, I have a new goal to blog at least once a week from now on. So please get on my case if I don't. I've got to keep a journal somehow and I think this is the only thing that will work for me. Happy February, everyone! xo

Because I felt like blogging....

2011-10-02T19:40:00.000-06:00

Do you ever have one of those weeks where you feel like you are on the verge of tears almost every second of every day? Well this past week was one of those weeks for me.(If you never feel like this, then I want to be you. Sometimes I think I have more emotions than the average girl.) I can't really find one main reason for why this past week was like that. There were just lots of little things that made it a not so great week.

Maybe it's the fact that the year is almost over and some things that I had hoped would have happened by now, haven't. Maybe it's because a woman in my ward accused me of not fulfilling my (former)church calling while at a ward activity. Maybe it's because there are about a thousand things I still want to do to our house before winter comes. Maybe it's because there aren't enough hours in a day to accomplish everything I want to. Whatever it is, I hope this funk goes away real soon. Poor Josh. I am not a very good wife when I'm like this.

Anyway, I'm trying to think positive and count my blessings. I have a lot of blessings.

I have a roof over my head. I live in a home in a neighborhood and ward that I love.

I have a cute husband who is always logical and quick to forgive me of my faults.

I have a wonderful family and fabulous inlaws. I have the cutest little pomeranian that ever lived.

My nieces are dang cute and I love them and I know they love me.

I have wonderful friends that are always willing to listen and be there for me.

My face has finally cleared up after being attacked by zits the entire summer.

I am blessed to have the knowledge of the gospel and I am so grateful I had the opportunity to be spiritually fed this weekend by the words of our beloved prophet and apostles.

I got my hair done yesterday by my wonderful mother in law and there really is nothing better than fresh blonde and a fresh cut. I am loving my new bangs.

I got some new hair products at cost thanks to my mother in law. I love getting new hair products. Especially for cheap.

I have a new church calling that I absolutely love. I am now the Mia Maid adviser and I absolutely love and adore the girls and the leaders that I work with.

One of my darling Mia Maids made my week when she asked me if I would give her a ride to Wal-Mart tomorrow and help her pick up the products she needs to complete one of her Personal Progress projects. It made me feel so good that she just met me and she didn't hesitate to ask for help. I love her so much already.

I have so many blessings.

Here's to a better week!

hair help

2011-10-01T00:38:00.001-06:00

Okay friends...

I'm getting my hair done soon and I need some advice. I am so sick of my hair right now and it doesn't help that I have two inch, dirty blonde roots. blah. Overall, I'm ready for a little change. Nothing drastic, but just something to spice things up a bit. Maybe some more layers-since mine are practically grown out and maybe some cute swoopy bangs? You be the judge. Here are some pictures of styles I like. Please share your thoughts.

Love the bangs. Not too short and not too thick. But obviously I wouldn't let them hang down into my eyes like that.

Carrie always has perfect hair. I love the idea of bangs when wearing your hair up.

I pretty much wish my hair could look like this everyday. So sassy and full of volume. I love the layers.

The color is darker than what I would ever do, but I love the bangs and the loose curls. Love the pink dress too :)

Lauren Conrad always has perfect hair. I love the long layers. I want my hair to grow, grow grow.

Carrie, Carrie, Carrie. Please trade me hair. Or send your stylist to do my hair everyday. I love the length + the bangs.

Love the sassy bangs and layers.

I love the long and straight look as well. I want my hair to be this long. Maybe by next summer.

Anyway, your input would be appreciated. Bangs or no bangs. I just can't decide.

Thank you, friends! And more blogging is on it's way. I'm way behind...

Follow the Prophet

2011-09-16T23:59:00.001-06:00

All my life I've been taught to follow the Prophet. I really strive to do that and this is definitely something I follow the Prophet on.

Go UTES!

Engaged

2011-08-29T22:23:00.000-06:00

Love must be in the air.

Over the past two weeks, we've had TWO big engagements take place in our families.

First up, Trevor and Jeana.

Trevor is Josh's younger brother and we have all been waiting a long time for this engagement to happen. Two weeks ago, Trevor finally sealed the deal and asked Jeana to marry him.

I absolutely love and adore Jeana(Trevor too!) She is the perfect match for Trevor and the perfect addition to the Meadows family. We need more girls in our family. Josh is the oldest of five boys and all I know is that there will be a special place in heaven for his mom. Those boys have put her through the ringer(they still do). It has been so nice to have Jeana around to help me and Sandy keep those boys in line. :) Please pray our first baby is a girl. The family needs it.

I am so excited to have Jeana as a sister. I know she and I will be great friends and sisters. I am so happy for them and can't wait for January 3rd.

Next up, my cute cousin, Whitney.

I can't believe my cute little cuzy is all grown up and getting married. Whitney is the little sister I never had. She and I only have brothers, so she and I have filled that void in each other's lives since we are both sister-less. We have always been close and people often mistake us for sisters(we have the exact same nose and the same Wonnacott double chin!). I have so many fun memories with Whitney. From Hawaii trips, to being her EFY counselor seven years ago, to playing with our Grandma's toys when we were little, to shopping trips to Nordstrom and MAC makeup, I can't even put into words how much this girl means to me.

Whitney was the maid of honor at my wedding and I can't wait to be there with her on her wedding day.

(I tried to add a picture of us on my wedding day, but my computer is being dumb.)

I am so happy for Whitney and Jimmer. They are in for a wild ride, but I know they can be great examples to those around them as they are thrown into this crazy lifestyle. (And hey- I might have an "in" on meeting Kyle Korver. Finally!) I wish them all the happiness in the world. I know their wedding with be out of this world. Love you, cuzy!

The Best 2 Years

2011-08-11T19:42:00.002-06:00

On Saturday, August 6th, Josh and I celebrated our TWO year anniversary.

Seriously. Where does the time go?

Time flies when you're having fun.

To celebrate our marriage, we went to dinner at Benihana and it was delish. And thanks to them, we have a photo to document our anniversary. Thank you, Benihana!

We kept our anniversary very low key, but it was perfect. We wanted to plan a little weekend getaway, but we are going to Lake Powell in a few weeks and we still have a million things we want/need to do to our house, so our anniversary gift to each other will be a new dishwasher. or sink. or bathroom vanity.

It was nice to have a relaxing night, just the two of us. Life seems to be as busy and crazy as ever, so these little moments are few and far between.

I am truly a lucky woman to be married to Joshua Anthony Meadows. He is always so much fun to be around and he can make me laugh no matter what kind of mood I'm in. No matter how hard I fight it, the boy can always make me smile when I'm upset. He's the most patient, level headed and logical person I know. He can always set me straight when I'm being emotional, feeling stressed or worried about anything. I would say we balance each other out pretty darn well. I love that he is ALL mine.

Here's to eternity, babe!

P.S. I just realized today marks exactly FOUR years since our first date. August is a good month.

2 hours and 20 minutes

2011-07-22T22:51:00.003-06:00

What can you accomplish in 2 hours and 20 minutes? Well if you're my dad, you can complete a marathon. That's right - 26.2 miles in 2 hours and 20 minutes. And on top of that amazing time, he WON the marathon. This was not the only marathon he won...he also won the Las Vegas marathon two years in a row. Seriously, who does that? Scott Bringhurst does.

I have to take a minute to brag about my dad. Not only is he the nicest, most genuine person you'll ever meet, but he is also an amazing runner. We're talking three time All American Runner. Marathon winner. Record setter.

Back in 1974 my dad won the Deseret News marathon. Since the marathon is coming up this weekend, KSL did a little spotlight on him. Here is the link. Check out his mustache! WOW.

Even at 63, my dad still gets out there and runs as much as his MS lets him. When I lived at home, there were several different times I was driving home from somewhere and I would see a man running ridiculously fast and as I got closer I realized, "Hey, that's MY dad!" He's still got it - even though he would tell you otherwise. He is so humble and will never admit to his greatness, so I am grateful that KSL was able to show him off a little bit.

I hope there is some part in me that has a little bit of his running gene. Josh and I have started running a little bit and by the time we get to the bottom of the street, we want to die. I have a long way to go before I can even attempt a marathon someday, but if I ever do, I will be lucky enough to have the best coach ever.

Dad, you are awesome. I love you.

I don't like dental school

2011-06-27T21:53:00.000-06:00

Today I really dislike dental school. Like really, REALLY, really dislike it. Josh feels the same.

We dislike dental school because it has taken our best friends to Louisville, Kentucky for the next four years.

I can't say enough good things about Ty and Lauren. They have seriously been the best friends Josh and I could ask for. It's going to be a huge adjustment having them gone. We miss them already.

Thank goodness this whole dental school thing isn't permanent. In retrospect, four years isn't THAT long, right? I've been thinking back to what I was doing four years ago so I can get a feel for how fast the time will pass....

Four years ago I was working as an EFY counselor and I became an aunt when Ava was born. Josh and I also had our first date almost four years ago. All of these events seem like they were only a year ago. If these next four years go by as fast as the past four years have then I can totally do this! I also made Lauren start a blog so that she can keep me up to date on all of their adventures. You'll blog all the time, right Laur? :)

Last week we spent as much time with Tyler and Lauren as possible until we had to say our goodbyes.

We had a little pool party with a bunch of friends

The girls -this picture turned out blurry, but I still like it

Josh, Me, Lauren and Ty

Me and Lauren. Love her.

Tyler and Lauren the day before moving day

Me and Lauren

Josh and Tyler

We are already looking forward to seeing them when they come in town in August and again in December and then next summer. We will definitely plan a trip or two out there to visit them while they're gone. And the good news is, WICKED will be playing in Louisville next year so I'm pretty sure we will have to plan a trip during that time. Louisville is also a short hour and a half from where the Indianapolis Colts play(Josh's favorite team) so we might have to go to an NFL game as well. It's a win/win situation!

As much as I'm going to miss our besties, I know this will be an amazing experience for them. They will grow as a couple and make many wonderful memories over the next four years. Tyler worked and studied so hard to get into dental school and I know his hard work will pay off. Ty and Lauren, we love you!

Paradise

2011-05-29T11:53:00.002-06:00

Last week, Josh and I were lucky enough to vacation in our favorite place on earth - Kauai, Hawaii. We honeymooned there, and were so excited to go back. (I cried on the way to the airport at the end of our honeymoon because I was worried that we would never go back!) Anyway, we went with Josh's family and had an amazing time. The weather could not have been better, which we were very grateful for after having a hurricane warning on our honeymoon and two days of pouring rain.

This vacation was much needed. These past few months seem like a crazy blur after all the work we've been doing and continue to do to our house and both Josh and I have been working six days a week most weeks so that we have a few extra dollars to keep making improvements to our little home. I feel like I only ever see Josh in the evenings and because we are so busy, we rarely get to spend quality time together. Vacations are good for the soul and good for your marriage. Once in a while you need a break from your everyday routine and have a little carefree fun.

Anyway, here are some highlights from the trip!

Stopping at an overlook on our way to the beach

Trevor and his GF Jeana. If he doesn't marry her, we are kicking him out of the family.

On a beautiful hike

The wonderful people who made this trip happen

My favorite little birds in Hawaii. This guy totally posed for me.

Me and Riley(aka "Roo Roo")

Me and my favorite boy

Josh jumping into Queen's bath...doesn't he look like a little boy with his legs like that?

Girls at the farmer's market

We bought lots of yummy fruit

My father in law, Hugh, and my brother in law, Connor, won a hula contest. Funniest thing ever. We went to a hula show at this cute little shopping center and they selected a few members of the crowd to come up and be in a contest.

Here is some footage of the contest. If you know them, it just makes it that much more funny because they are not the type of guys to go up and do this sort of thing. Please excuse the shaking and my crazy laugh during the video.

Bali Hai...if you've seen South Pacific then you've heard of this mountain

Our favorite beach, Kalihiwai! Best boogie boarding waves.

Getting ready to boogie

On our last day we hiked to this place called Secret Turtle Cave and the views were amazing

We finally made it to the cave after walking through lots of slippery rocks in the ocean

And there were turtles inside! It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. I love sea turtles.

Family photo in the cave after our little friend went back to sea.

We had such a great time. Josh and I love Hawaii and we hope to go back several times. We would seriously live there if we could. We love everything about it. I wish everyone could go to Hawaii at least once because it is such a beautiful and fun place.

I just have to share one of my favorite moments from the trip real quick. Josh's youngest brother, Riley(or Roo Roo as we like to call him) is 13 and has such a fun personality. He still has a lot of little boy in him and he was really excited for the plane ride because he had never been on an airplane before. Anyway, the flight from Los Angeles to Hawaii is just over five hours long, but feels like an eternity. Riley was sitting in the row in front of his parents so he was sitting next to two strangers and fell asleep with his head against the window. A little while into his nap, he switched from resting on the window to the stranger's shoulder. He was out cold and napped for close to two hours on this man's shoulder. It was awesome. Oh Roo Roo, thank you for the entertainment!

And I want to give a special thanks to my wonderful in-laws for making this trip possible. We had such a great time and we are so blessed to have you in our lives. Thanks for all you do for us. We love you!

Hawaii, until we meet again. We love you. ALOHA!

Happy Mother's Day

2011-05-08T10:41:00.003-06:00

Happy Mother's Day
to all the wonderful mothers in my life!

I love you!

Garr Bear's Wedding

2011-05-05T09:57:00.001-06:00

Hello Blog world. Long time no see.

I promise to get my blog back on real soon...for all two of you that read it.

Anyway, last week I was able to go to my cousin Garrett's wedding. Garrett(AKA Garr Bear) is the little brother I never had. I have always been close to him and his siblings. My brother's are seven and nine years older than me and growing up, that age gap was very difficult sometimes. But lucky for me I have lots of fun cousins that are just a few years younger than me and have been able to spend lots of time with them throughout my life.

Garrett was able to be there on my wedding day and his sister, Whitney, was my maid of honor, so I was so grateful I was able to be there on his big day. It was the first sealing I've been to since my own. There is absolutely nothing better than being inside the temple. The Spirit was so strong and I cried the whole time. I kept thinking about my wedding day and about how lucky I am to be sealed to Josh.

The wedding was absolutely beautiful. It could rival the royal wedding, I tell ya! Garrett's now wife, Ashton, is from Mesa, so they were sealed in the Mesa Arizona Temple and had a beautiful reception outdoors that evening. It was 97 degrees on their wedding day. I felt like I had flash forwarded to summer. I loved it! Garrett on the other hand is from Littleton, Colorado and had a beautiful dinner at the Cherry Hills Country Club. Shortly after arriving to Denver from Mesa, it snowed. I much prefer the Arizona weather.

Well, let's get to the pictures, shall we?

Adorable, yes?

Best Cuzies

Mr. and Mrs. Wonnacott

The beautiful Mesa Temple

The cute Groomsmen

Me and the beautiful bride

New Sisters

Me and Whitney

The beautiful reception

Me and the cute groom

Cutting the cake

First dance

Jimmer doing the Dougie. He has moves.

The getaway car

A Jimmer sandwich at the Colorado Reception

Hanging out before the dinner

My cute cousin Jimmy, the groom's brother

Girl Cousins

Cousins + Jimmer

Love this girl like a sister.

As you can tell, the wedding was beautiful. I had such a great time, but missed Josh like crazy. Because of his crazy work schedule and a family trip coming up, he wasn't able to come. Poor guy. I felt so bad having all this fun while he was back home working. We haven't had many nights apart in the nearly two years that we've been married, so it was very weird going to sleep without him next to me. I can honestly say I think it is healthy for a marriage to spend some time away from your spouse. It really made both Josh and I realize just how much we need each other and rely on each other. It's so easy to take your spouse for granted when you see them everyday and this trip has made me appreciate Josh more than ever.

p.s. Can someone please explain to me how I can put pictures side by side in blog posts? I hate that this post is a mile long. Thanks!

Sneak Peak

2011-03-29T21:27:00.001-06:00

I know I haven't blogged in over a month, but becoming a homeowner had taken almost every minute of my free time. I'm not complaining though because I am falling in love with our cute little home and it's been fun seeing all the changes we've made to the house It's come a long way and all of our hard work has definitely been paying off. I'll be filling this blog with posts and pictures of the before's and after's, but that can't happen until I find where my camera cord ended up after the move. :)

I'll leave you with a few pictures that made it to the computer when my cord was accessible.

Our humble abode. I know it doesn't look like much, but to us, it is our home and we love it.

And just to give you an idea of what we started with, this is our bedroom before...notice the wallpaper, popcorn ceilings, window coverings, ceiling fan, outlets etc.

A really BIG purchase....

2011-02-19T23:23:00.002-07:00

As of March 1, 2011, Josh and I will be homeowners.

I can't believe it!

I am so excited about it, but I'm not gonna lie, I'm also scared out of my mind!

Owning a home is such a HUGE responsibility, but it's a good responsibility, right?

The realization that this is really happening has brought up all sorts of mixed emotions -mostly good ones though. I think I am past the freaking out stage(fingers crossed).

When we first found out our offer was accepted, we were absolutely thrilled! But a few days later, we started thinking about everything that goes into owning a home, and I had a few little breakdowns. Not that I didn't want the house, it's just a big commitment and kind of overwhelming when you take everything into consideration. No more calling the apartment manager if something stops working. Now we are responsible for anything and everything that goes wrong with our home. Our monthly rent will soon turn into a monthly mortgage, which will definitely be more than our rent, Etc, Etc. Having a home will be dang expensive!

Lucky for me, Josh is a very rational and levelheaded person. He calmed me right down and reassured me that this is the right thing for us - and it is.

I don't know if you remember my post about 2011? This one?

Anyway, the first goal listed has been accomplished. We are staying in our current ward and we couldn't be more excited about it. We love our ward, love our bishop and we already know we are going to love our neighbors. The families that live on our soon to be street have been so supportive and excited for us. Several of our former Sunbeams live on our street and one of them has already told his mom that he's going to come over and play with us all the time. How cute!

It all came together much faster than we expected, but everything just fell into place.

Our bishop, who is also a realtor, knew we were looking and was going to help sell a home in our ward. He gave us a call to come look through it before it would go on the market and we both fell in love. We went through it again the next day with our parents, and they liked it as much as we did. Five days later we made an offer and two days later, it was accepted.

The house is definitely a bit of a fixer upper, but we're excited to make it how we want it. Sure we could have bought a newer, nicer home out in the boonies for the same price, but location was something that was very important to me. If I knew I would be a stay at home mom as soon as we have our first baby, then I wouldn't care where our house was, but since I know I'll still have to work when that time comes, I wanted to be close to our families. Both of our mom's love babies more than the average human being does, so I know they will want to see their grandbabies as much as possible. :)

I am looking forward to this new adventure. I love this little house. It's a house I see us starting a family in. A house I totally picture us in. I know it will take a lot of work and a lot of sacrifice, but I wouldn't want it any other way and I wouldn't want to do this with anyone other than Joshua.

Pictures coming soon!

Nate the Great

2011-02-13T23:02:00.042-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, Josh and I had a date night with some of my co-workers. To give you some background on my job, I work for a wonderful place called The Wood Connection. I started working there about six months ago and it has been such a blessing. Even though it's not what I pictured myself doing after getting a degree in Broadcast Journalism, I am so happy there and for the time being, I know it's where I belong. I love what I do and I work with wonderful people.

One of those wonderful individuals is Nate - also known as Nate the Great. I can't think of a better nickname for him. He really is one of the greatest guys I know.

Nate is 32 years old and autistic and has the best attitude about life. It's impossible to be around Nate and be in a bad mood. He always puts a smile on my face and is a joy to be around.

For the past few months, Nate has been wanting to go on a "date" with some of the girls at work. Per Nate's request, a few weeks ago we all went to dinner at Hire's, bowling at his favorite bowling alley, Sue & Rich and got his favorite ice cream from Nielsen's Frozen Custard. We had a blast. I took my camera to capture the fun.

Nate asked me to take a picture every time he got a spare so that he could see how happy he was.

He told me he was so good at bowling because he took a bowling class in March of 1993. He has a GREAT memory!

Also, please take note of his Biff shirt! haha! I love it!

Another fun thing you should know about Nate is that he LOVES to have his face painted. I think he has it painted at least once a week. He brought his very own face paint so that we could paint his face.

He had Rachel paint his bowling score on one cheek...

Then he asked Lieca to paint his nose blue.

He had me paint his favorite NFL team's name on his forehead

He also had me paint a "5" on his cheek because that's his favorite number.

The girls with Nate the Great

As you can tell, Nate really is Great!

One of the highlights of my day is saying "hi" to Nate when he gets to work. Whenever I say, "Hi Nate. How are you?" he says, "I'm great! I'm happy." He says that every time.

I want to be a little more like Nate.

Claire Bear

2011-02-05T11:35:00.000-07:00

This week our cute little Claire turned ONE!

I really can't believe it has been a whole year since she was born. It seems like just yesterday we were welcoming this sweet little girl into the world.

Claire is the sweetest baby on the planet. She has such a cute personality and the sweetest disposition and I love her little grin. I can't get enough of her.

I stole this picture from my sister-in-law's facebook- look at that face!

One of my favorite things about Claire is watching her suck her thumb. That baby loves her thumb. Every time she sucks it, she puts her cute little finger over her nose. She is precious. I could kiss her little cheeks all day long.

She even sucks it when she's asleep...with a curler in her hair

Another thing I love about her is that she has the perfect amount of "chub" on her. She has the cutest thighs...it's the only time rolls can be cute, and they are :)

If that face doesn't make you baby hungry, then I don't know what will!

Oh and check our her "jeggings" Love it!

On Sunday we had a birthday party for Claire Bear. She got spoiled as usual and got to experience cake and ice cream for the first time. And like a true Bringhurst, she went straight for the ice cream and couldn't get enough. It's in our blood to love ice cream.

Here she is in all of her cake and ice cream glory

I love my nieces so much! They bring so much joy into our family. I can't wait for them to have cousins someday...

A New Year

2011-01-12T22:36:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to blog about our Christmas, but now I feel that too much time has passed to make it worth blogging about, so I'll give a brief recap.

We had a wonderful holiday. Actually, our whole month of December was pretty dang awesome....Festival of Trees, Semi-Formal Christmas party, ugly sweater parties, the lights on Temple Square, David Archuleta with the Mo-Tab(My personal favorite) and a fabulous Christmas with both of our families. Josh and I were spoiled. We are so blessed to have such wonderful families.

Anyway, 2010 went by faster than any other year, don't you think? It's crazy how each year seems to go by faster than the previous year.

Overall, 2010 was a great year for us.

We survived our first year of marriage - We both started new jobs - Taught the cutest Sunbeams in the entire world - Welcomed a new niece to the family - Saw Legally Blonde: The Musical - I successfully pranked Josh - I started learning how to sew - Attended our first ever Jazz Playoff game - Celebrated the retirement of both my mom and dad - Saw Backstreet Boys and Carrie Underwood in concert - Josh got his first and hopefully last kidney stone - Said goodbye to my cute Grandma - Had a lot of good times with family and friends.

Things we are looking forward to 2011:

- Buying a house...hopefully in our ward(fingers crossed!)
- Going on a vacation. A real vacation - I will make sure this happens!
- Paying off my car - oh yeah, it's happening this month!
- Attending the temple at least once a month
- Going to Arizona/Colorado for my cousin's wedding
- Spending lots of time with friends and family
- And hopefully, conceive a child. :)

Happy 2011 Everyone!

Our Sunbeams

2010-12-29T23:03:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, Josh and I got released from our calling as the Sunbeam teachers. I can't believe a whole year has passed since we started teaching those darling children. Don't worry, I only cried during half of class time and half of sharing time and tears may or may not be forming now as I write about these dear children.

Sunbeams are such a fun age. They come straight from nursery and Primary is a whole new world to them. They have to adjust from snack time and playing with toys to singing time, sharing time and class time. It was definitely not an easy adjustment for some of them, but seeing the growth in them from a year ago has been priceless.

It was an absolute joy to teach them. I loved every minute and I know Josh did as well. And I know those kids loved Josh! They all loved to sit by him or give him hugs and they thought he was so "silly." I'm pretty sure at least once during each class one of the kids would say, "Josh, you're silly!" He is silly, but Josh is great with kids. I am so grateful we had the opportunity to work together in a church calling. Especially this one. It was a great experience for us and we were able to catch a glimpse at how each of us are with children. Wonderful preparation for the future :)

I've had a hard time letting go of these dear children. Even though they tried our patience sometimes, I loved all 10 of them. Yes, 10. Sometimes our class was pure chaos, but I wouldn't trade those moments for anything. I would keep these kids as my own and I wish I could teach them until they graduate from Primary.

I had my camera in my purse on Sunday and I had to take a few pictures so I can remember these darling faces forever. I love them.

(Parents of our Sunbeams-if you are uncomfortable with having pictures of your child on my blog, please let me know and I will take them down)

Me and the little darlins...Just one was absent on Sunday

Josh and our kids

Me and my girls

Josh and his boys

I'm not going to lie, I'm kind of dreading church on Sunday because it won't be spent with these beautiful children, but their new teachers will be awesome and I am glad they are in good hands. Josh and I were so lucky to have these children be a part of our lives. Children are so close to the Spirit and I am so grateful we were able to feel their sweet Spirits.

Spiders

2010-12-02T22:13:00.000-07:00

Oh my dear sweet Joshua.

I have come to the conclusion that he is just as afraid of spiders as I am.

And here's why:

About a year ago, Josh sat up in bed in the middle of the night and yelled, "Where's the spider!?!?!"

The rest of the conversation went like this:

Allison: What spider? There's not a spider. (Side note: We live on the top level of our apartment complex so spiders are a rarity)

Josh: Yes there is!! It's a huge one and it bit my toe and my toe really hurts!!

Allison: Babe. There's not a spider. Go back to bed.

Josh: Yes there is. Feel my toe. It bit my toe. There's a huge bump on it!

**I feel his toe. No bump.**

Josh: I'm sorry I have to turn the light on and find that spider. Owe! My toe really hurts!

**He turns the light on. No spider. We turn the light off, go back to bed and laugh about it the next morning.**

So then this morning about 4 a.m. Josh wakes up and yells, "Ahh! There's a spider on me!!"

And you guessed it. There wasn't a spider!

haha! Bless is heart. He was afraid it was going to go in his mouth.

I'm thinking one of these days I should put a fake spider in the bed. :)

Thankful

2010-11-24T23:28:00.001-07:00

I have loved reading everyone's "Thankful" posts over the past few days. It's really made me reflect on everything I am thankful for. Here are some of my many blessings. I am a lucky girl.

I am so thankful for Josh. He is so good to me and I love him more than anything.
My family. I love them all so much and feel so blessed to have the parents and family that I do. And I have the cutest nieces on the planet!
My in-laws. I scored big-time when it comes to in-laws.
Our church calling. I love our Sunbeams so much! I would seriously keep all of them. I will be so sad when we get released.
Our ward. I was so attached to my home ward and was worried I would never feel at home in another ward. I'm so happy that my thinking was wrong-very wrong. I really hope we can find a house in our ward boundaries. We don't want to leave.
My friends. I love all my girls so much-My high school girls, Xi Babes, childhood friends, school friends, church friends, I love you all! I am also very thankful for Josh's friends because they all have awesome wives who are now my good friends as well.
Our cute apartment. Although I am excited to find a house, I love our cozy apartment. It feels like home to me and I feel safe here. My favorite place to be is at home with Josh.
My job. I seriously love it. It may not be the most glamorous job on the planet, but I have been so much happier ever since I started working there three months ago. I have learned a lot about crafts-which are something I love. I absolutely love the people I work with and I am so glad an old friend from the U referred me to the job and has now become my good friend. Watch out, Swiss Days! :)
Music! Oh I could not live without music.
Flannel sheets. I love getting in bed in the winter to soft, cozy sheets.
Cadbury chocolates. My favorite treats at Christmas and Easter time.
My dog. She is the cutest little ball of fur that has ever lived.
My cute Grandpa. He is too cute for words. I know he misses my Grandma like crazy but he is staying strong and wants to continue living life to the fullest.
The Gospel. I would be so lost without it.
The knowledge that I will see my Grandma again.
My health.
The future. I am thankful for the things to come-whether they are good or bad.

Happy Thanksgiving, Everyone!

Holiday Decor

2010-11-10T21:39:00.003-07:00

I LOVE decorating for holidays. When I was growing up, my mom always had fun decorations out for each holiday and I want to do the same for my children. It adds such a fun feeling to the home.

I have started collecting decorations little by little and have started making several of my own.

Today I put my Thanksgiving decorations up and looking at them puts a smile on my face.

Here is the fall door hang I made. I love that I can use it for all of fall.

I made these cute pumpkins that can also be up for October and November.

My cute turkey!

Fall table runner

Cute Pilgrims!

Fall frame.

Fun figurines for my shelf.

This has also been on our door for part of Fall. Now I have it on our coat closet door. It will definitely be on our door the week of the BYU/UTAH game. Go Utes!

I meant to blog about my fun Halloween decorations back in October, so I'm just going to blog about them now! I LOVE my Halloween decorations so much.

My Halloween tablecloth.

I love my Bats!

I bought this picture up at Swiss Days and I absolutely love it. It was done by an artist named Jon McNaughton. I also bought a beautiful picture of the Nativity as well as a picture of Christ from him. I love his work. You can check him out here.

My Wicked letter set. Love it. Anyone recognize the font? :)

Cute Halloween phrases I got at Michaels for $1.

Fun find at the Quilted Bear

My cute Frankenstein.

Fun plaque I made. I'm in love with the paper I found for it.

And last but not least....the cutest Halloween decorations EVER! The second I saw these I knew I had to have them. I know if I wouldn't have bought them that I would regret it every year when I got my Halloween decorations out. I'm pretty sure they were meant for me. :)

Oh I love the Holidays! Now I've got to get to work on my Christmas crafts. I can't wait to finish them and put them up!

A week and a half later...

2010-11-10T20:48:00.000-07:00

...I am FINALLY blogging about our Halloween.

I know I would regret not blogging about it, so here we go.

The week of Halloween ended up being really crazy with my Grandma's funeral and everything else, so our costumes weren't figured out or purchased until the VERY last minute. And when I say very, I mean we bought our costumes 20 minutes before we went to our ward Halloween party on the 29th.

We had no idea what to dress up as, but after wracking my brain a little, I remembered that Target sold these bad boys in our size:

So, we went as babies.

The next night our friends, The Crayk's, hosted the funnest Halloween party ever! We had dinner and then did a digital camera scavenger hunt. If you've never done one, I highly recommend doing it at your next party! It was so much fun. I want to do it again!

But I am pretty certain that baby Josh's favorite part of the party was playing with the babies.

Everyone had GREAT costumes! Unfortunately I didn't get pictures of all the couples, but here are the ones I got.

Sean and Ariel as mimes

Ty and Lauren as Poison Ivy and Batman. Ty was hilarious!

Chris and Shianne as Teletubbies and Maddex as a monkey

This party was just what I needed after a difficult week. Thank you Crayk family for the fun time! Can't wait for next year!

What a week!

2010-11-03T22:40:00.004-06:00

First of all, I just want to thank all of you for the love and support you have shown me this past week. Thank you for your kind words and for your prayers. I definitely felt them. I am so blessed to have such wonderful friends in my life.

Last week was one of the hardest weeks of my life, but also one of the most uplifting. Losing my Grandma has been so hard for me, but I have felt the Spirit so much knowing where she is now.

To add to all the craziness, I was just getting over a cold when my Grandma passed away, but after a lot of crying, all that drainage in my throat brought some of those cold symptoms back and gave me one of the worst coughs I've ever had. Not a good thing to have happen when you have to sing at your Grandma's funeral.

Even though I was a little under the weather and mourning the loss of my sweet Grandma, I was able to learn so much about her. She was amazing. More amazing than I ever realized. I will always look up to her and hope to be the kind of woman she was.

My Grandma's funeral was perfect. Absolutely perfect. Everyone's talks paid a wonderful tribute to her and the Christlike woman she was. I learned so much about her life and her relationship with my Grandpa. They are a prime example of what marriage is all about.

Like I said in my previous post, my Grandma had asked me to sing at her funeral. I honestly didn't know if I could do it. Singing at funerals is so hard, especially if the funeral is for someone you were close to.

All week I prayed and prayed asking Heavenly Father to give me the strength to make it through my song without crying. On top of that, I had a nasty cough which made me that much more nervous.

I can honestly say my prayers were answered. I made it through my song without crying and I think I sang it better than any of the times I practiced it. I didn't even feel nervous and I was able to sing with the confidence I needed to make it through the entire song. I tried to think about my Grandma and make the song as good for her as I possibly could. I am so thankful for answered prayers. As soon as the song ended and I headed back to my seat, the waterworks kicked in with full force! But that was okay. I had held in my emotions and was able to keep them in until my song was over-which was exactly what I had hoped for.

I am so grateful for my Grandma and the things she taught me. I am thankful for answered prayers and feel so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends in my life. I am especially thankful for the knowledge that death is NOT the end. I will see my Grandma again.

On top of the funeral and everything else going on last week, my dad retired after teaching for several years. I could not finish this post without letting him know how proud I am of him.

His retirement happened sooner than we expected, but it was the right time for him.

My dad is one of my heroes. He has been battling Multiple Sclerosis for several years now and not once has he ever complained about it. I know he does not feel well or normal a lot of the time but he has never been one to complain or let anyone know when he's hurting. Most people don't even know he has MS. He has not let this disease interfere with his happiness. He has always taken such good care of his body and I know that has helped his MS not progress as fast as it could. His job has become more and more stressful each year, which can have a big impact on MS, and I know that his retirement will only improve his health and prolong his life.

I can't believe both of my parents are retired now! I feel old :)

I love you dad! Happy retirement!

My sweet Grandma

2010-10-26T00:57:00.002-06:00

Tonight we said goodbye to my sweet Grandma.

It's such a bittersweet feeling. Mostly sweet, but I will miss her so much.

She couldn't have gone in a better way. She was at home, in her own bed with my grandpa holding her hand. It was sweet and so perfect. I wish everyone could go like that.

I grew up only five minutes away from where my grandparents live and have always been really close to them. I am so incredibly grateful to have had such a great relationship with them. They are the cutest grandparents on the planet.

My Grandma lived 90 beautiful years. She was a classy woman and a wonderful example to everyone around her. She was constantly serving her family and everyone she knew.

She was able to spend over 64 years on earth with her sweetheart. They were complete opposites in several ways, but had such a strong marriage. She waited for him for four years while he was serving in World War II and soon after his return, they were married for time and all eternity.

I know my grandpa will miss her like crazy, but he is grateful she's not suffering anymore and he knows he will be with her again someday. We are so lucky to have that knowledge. It makes difficult times like these a little easier.

I want to write down some of my favorite memories of my grandma. They are all so fresh in my mind and I don't want to forget any of them.

She always had Chicken in a Biscuit crackers in her cupboard. They will always remind me of her.
I loved having sleepovers at her house. My cousin Julia and I would often sleep there when we didn't have school and we always wanted to put her shower caps on. We were so weird! Every time I slept there, a yummy breakfast would be ready on the table when I woke up. The meal almost always included raspberries and cream. To this day I still buy cream whenever I buy raspberries. It's the best.
My grandma had so many fun toys for us to play with. Her Fisher Price castle was the best! It had a secret passage and a drawbridge. They just don't make toys like they used to.
I remember her taking me to see "The Wizard of Oz" in the theaters because she knew it was my favorite movie.
She always got her hair done(shampoo set) each week. She had a wind bonnet and a rain bonnet that she would always wear if she was worried about her hair getting messed up.
I remember she always had some perfume powder in the bathroom and I always wanted to wear some because I thought it was so cool.
She was really good at pampering anyone who was sick. She always took such good care of my grandpa during his battles with cancer and pneumonia.
She always had her camera with her. I am glad she did because she has a lot of great pictures that we will cherish forever.
She was really good at the piano and played all the time until she got too shaky to play.
My grandpa is a huge sports fan and because of that, my grandma became a big sports fan. She loved watching the Jazz and she also had a crush on Kyle Korver. :)
A few years ago I was dating someone on the U of U football team. My grandma had a major crush on him. (Don't worry, she had an even bigger crush on Josh!) He broke up with me right before football camp and not only broke my heart, but hers as well. She was VERY mad at him for hurting me(and her) and during those few weeks of camp, she would always say, "I never see his name in the paper so he must not be doing that well at football." haha. She always spoke her mind and I love that about her.
She would always tell me that every night she would pray that I would find the right person to marry. I am so glad she was able to be there when I was sealed to Josh. My wedding was the last wedding she ever attended.
She loved Josh and always commented on what pretty eyes he had.
My grandma loved pomeranians and I like to think I got my love for them from her. Almost 7 years ago they got Maggie and she was her baby. My grandma spoiled the heck out of her! When they first got her, my grandma would say that she liked to sing the song "You Light Up My Life" to Maggie and that every night she would kiss Maggie on the forehead before bed.
My grandpa doesn't believe in spaying or neutering, so they bred Maggie about four times and she produced the most beautiful puppies. I spent lots of time at my grandparent's playing with each litter and because of that, I grew even closer to both my grandma and grandpa. I am so glad some of those puppies have stayed in the family. It's no secret how much I love my little Elle.

I know sweet little Maggie will be lonesome for my grandma, but I will visit her often and try to keep her happy. I know my grandma will like that.

Per my grandma's request, I will be singing at the funeral on Friday. I am scared out of my mind. I love singing and performing, but singing at funerals is a whole different ball game. Please pray for me that I can make it through my song without crying. I want it to be beautiful for my grandma and I want to make her proud. Hopefully I can get all these tears out before then.

One of the last things my Grandma said to me yesterday was, "Alli, are you still singing?" and I said, "Yes, Grandma, I still sing."

Grandma, I will sing for you forever.

I love you so much, Grandma! I will never forget the things you taught me and I will carry on your legacy as best as I can. We will take good care of Grandpa and Maggie. I know I will see you again!

Girl's Night Out!

2010-09-27T22:44:00.002-06:00

Hey girls!

If any of you are looking for something fun to do while the men in your life are at the Priesthood session on Saturday night, you should check out my friend's Girls Night Out.

My good friend Brittany and her mom own an amazing wholesale home decor business and are having a fun little event this Saturday, October 2 from 6-8 p.m.

Brittany has also started a little clothing business and she has the cutest stuff! And most of it is $40 or less! You should check out her clothing blog at http://pearandpeonies.blogspot.com or join her fan page on Facebook by clicking here.

If I could describe Brittany in one word, it would be "CLASSY." She has amazing taste and has an eye for what looks good. I want to learn her secrets. :) I know you will love her stuff.

Here is the address for the event:

6567 S. Cottonwood Street(300 West)
Murray, UT

They will have clothing, jewelry and home decor. You will love it all!

Total GLEEK

2010-09-21T08:25:00.000-06:00

There are no words to describe how excited I am for this tonight!!

I can't wait for the music, the guest appearances, Sue Sylvester's hilarious comments and lots of Mr. Schuester. I may or may not have a crush on him.

Oh and Josh is excited as well. He may not admit it, but he is a total GLEEK!

I hope you all watch!

p.s. The Office starts on Thursday! YAY! Michael Scott's final season on the show. :( It won't be the same without him.
It's a great week in television!

My alter ego

2010-09-17T00:13:00.001-06:00

I need some advice.

I sort of have an alter ego. Some of you are aware of her...haha.

Over the past several months, I have done some Cinderella birthday parties for some of my good friends. {You can read more about those here, here or here.} Being a part of these parties is the cutest thing ever. Really, I wish every single one of you could go to a 3 or 4 year-old's birthday party as a Disney Princess. It is so rewarding.

I have had a blast helping out at these parties. Partly because I have always wanted to work as Cinderella at Disneyland, but mostly because the reactions I get from these darling little girls are priceless. I know it's not "Allison" they're excited to see, it's Cinderella! I would've loved to have a Disney Princess come to my birthday party when I was young, so I love being able to help make their birthday's more memorable.

Anyway, I have had quite a few inquiries from random people about doing a princess party for their daughter or someone else they know. In fact, I am in the process of booking another party for a friend of a friend. Because of this, I am considering doing princess parties on a regular basis.

It would be a fun way to make a little extra cash and I am thinking (and hoping) it could be sort of successful.

Now here is where you come in. I don't feel like I could advertise this on KSL or something like that because it could easily attract some nasty perverts out there. I feel like the best way to go about this is by word of mouth. I think I will create a blog all about the parties and include information, pricing and contact information. That way, if any of you lovely friends of mine happen to suggest it to someone, they would have a place to go see all of the information.

Do you think that's a good idea?

My next piece of advice that I need is pricing. So far I have only done it for good friends, and I could never charge a good friend for something like that so I have absolutely NO idea what to charge people.

I have heard of people charging around $150 for a "princess" to come to their child's party!! Are you kidding me? That is WAY too much for something so fun and rewarding. I want to make this affordable for people and $150 for a 3 year-old's birthday party is ridiculous.

I want to know what you think is a fair price. If you were having "Cinderella" come to your daughter's birthday party, what would you pay for something like that?

I am thinking somewhere around $50 for an hour and $75 for an hour and a half????

I don't know how to figure it all out. It does take some effort perfecting the Cinderella updo, and I have to drive to wherever the party is at, so I just need to come up with something reasonable for myself and the parent throwing the party.

Anyway, I would love your input! And please be honest! I want to know if you think this whole princess party thing could be successful and if so, what I should charge. Also, if it does get a good response, I am considering making a Sleeping Beauty costume because I think I could possibly pull her off as well. That would give people two different options. I also have a friend interested in being Belle, so there could be the possibility of having two princesses at one party!

I love helping a child's dream come true.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and for all of your help! I love you all!

Love,

Cinderella

Our night at the ER

2010-09-12T21:24:00.003-06:00

Josh and I have had quite an eventful weekend.

Yesterday afternoon Josh called me at work saying he was in a lot of pain. {in his groin of all places-probably the worst place to be in pain! (sorry if that is too much information!)} I told him he should try and find a doctor's office that was open on Saturdays or at least go over to Instacare.

Being the hard worker that he is, Josh finished mowing all 10 lawns and came home feeling miserable. He quickly showered and we headed over to Instacare. Thankfully, there wasn't a long wait and he got right in. Unfortunately the doctor only spent about 3 minutes with him and hardly looked him over. She determined he had some type of infection and prescribed an antibiotic for him. We left feeling discouraged that her time with Josh was so brief, but we went and got his medication, grabbed some dinner and headed home to relax.

We went to bed just after 10-which was shocking because if you know Josh, you know that he is a NIGHT OWL! I love going to bed early, so I was totally fine going to bed at that time on a Saturday night.

Just after 2 a.m., Josh woke me up and was moaning and groaning and saying he was in so much pain. He said the pain had moved up into his side and that he had never been in so much pain in his life. He got out of bed and paced around the apartment and would crouch into a fetal position every few seconds. I kept asking him if he wanted to go to the emergency room, and he kept saying, "No, no I'll be fine. I just need to relax."

After a few minutes, he finally said, "Hurry! Get dressed! We have to go to the emergency room now!"

We hurried down to the car and sped over to the ER. (If you ask Josh, he will claim that I wasn't speeding, but trust me, I was!)

We got to the ER around 2:45 and were relieved to find it quiet and empty. Josh was immediately taken back to a room and they began evaluating him. We had to wait a while in between the nurses taking his vitals and drawing his blood before he was seen by the doctor.

We kind of got two for the price of one as far as doctors go because a third year medical student came and examined him, and then he was also evaluated by the ER doctor. They both had the same suspicion on what was causing Josh so much pain- Kidney Stones. They were positive he didn't have the "infection" he was diagnosed with at Instacare. After they both examined him, they said a nurse would be in to pump some medicine in his IV to help with the pain. While waiting for the nurse, my cute husband looks at me with lots of pain in his eyes and says, "At least I can stay home tomorrow and watch a lot of football." haha. Even in excruciating pain, he still lets his personality shine through. I love him.

After some morphine, Josh started feeling like a million bucks. :) The med student came back in and said they were going to give Josh a CT scan, but that it could be up to 3 hours before the scan happened. YIKES! Somehow we got lucky and no more that 15 minutes later, a man came to get Josh for the CT scan. If we would've arrived at the hospital any later, we would have been there twice as long because while Josh was getting the scan done, 4 trauma patients were admitted to the ER. I feel so grateful that the timing happened the way it did.

A little while after the CT scan, the doctor and medical student came in to say that the Radiologist was really busy and wouldn't be able to evaluate the results of the scan for a few hours. Luckily they said they had both looked at it and were certain it was a kidney stone and it would be okay if we left the hospital. The doctor said he would call if the radiologist thought the stone was too big or anything like that. He wrote Josh a few prescriptions and we were home at six o'clock this morning.

Now Josh has to drink lots of liquids and hope that this thing passes soon. It does not sound fun at all. I have heard they are miserable! But I guess the good news is that he will be very sympathetic when I am in labor someday. :)

I hate seeing Josh in pain, but I am so grateful it is not something worse. He is tough and I know he can handle this. I am also grateful for the amazing ER staff at IMC. They were all so great to us. Every person, nurse and doctor we dealt with was so nice and spent time answering all of our questions and never made us feel rushed or last priority. If the maternity staff is as great as the ER staff, then I will definitely want to have my babies there. :)

Oh and lesson learned- Instacare is now referred to as InstaCRAP in my book! I want our $40 copay back!!

One year already?

2010-08-22T22:18:00.001-06:00

Two weeks ago we celebrated our one year anniversary!
{I know I am behind, but we were without a computer for what seemed like an eternity. :) But better late than never, right?}

I can't believe it has been one whole year since we did this:

And went here for our honeymoon.

To celebrate, we went to OUR restaurant, Asian Star. I call it "ours" because as mentioned in the previous post, Asian Star is where Josh and I went on our first date, and it is also where we got engaged.

After dinner we decided to go miniature golfing at Mulligans. It was fun reminiscing about our first date and enjoying the same activities for our anniversary. Unfortunately, we were only able to golf about 5 holes because a huge rainstorm came through! But it made the night that much more memorable.

We waited in the golf shop for a while, hoping the rain would let up so that we could finish our game, but the rain didn't look like it was stopping anytime soon. We went and got one of my favorite summertime treats, shaved ice, and headed back to our apartment to exchange gifts and watch our wedding video. It was a fun, relaxing and low key anniversary. We had hoped to get away somewhere, but Josh's yard care business he does on the weekends makes it hard to go anywhere during the summer. However, we are hoping to do a cruise or some sort of fun trip this fall or winter as a late anniversary trip. Hopefully it will work out!

What an incredible year it has been. The time has gone by faster than I ever thought possible, but I am loving every minute with my eternal companion. Marriage is definitely an adjustment and living with someone is very different than dating them, but it is a fun journey learning how to combine two different lives together.

I am so grateful for my cute husband and how hard he works for us. I am looking forward to spending many more anniversaries with him. I can't wait to see what the future has in store for us. I know there will be good times and hard times, but we will be able to get through it all because we have each other.

One year down, eternity to go!

August 11, 2007

2010-08-11T16:48:00.002-06:00

Three years ago today, Josh and I had our first date!!

I remember that day very well. It was a Saturday, and I had just finished my last week of EFY for the summer that morning. To be honest, I had mixed feelings about the date for a few different reasons. One being that this would technically be a blind date since it had been about 13 years since Josh's family moved from our ward and also the fact that this wasn't just an ordinary date. It was going to be a date with the Josh Meadows I had been in love with so many years ago.

I had been on my share of blind dates, so I didn't have very high expectations of my date with Josh. However, I was pretty dang nervous about seeing him for the first time in 13 years. Blind dates didn't make me nervous, but this one was different - different because this was going to be a date with my first crush.

I'll never forget Josh pulling up to my house in his red truck. My whole family was outside sitting in the shade and holding Ava, who was only two months old at the time. As soon as he came into the yard, I thought, "Oh crap. He is very attractive!" My nerves increased and I was starting to feel a little intimidated.

We got in his truck and I couldn't get over how good looking he was. He was just as attractive as he was 13 years ago. {By the way, some of my friends even commented on what a cute boy Josh was when they saw his childhood pictures in our wedding video :).} I remember feeling very shy and awkward, which was very unlike me on a blind date.

After a lot of awkward silences in the car, Josh reached in the backseat and grabbed a sheet of paper full of Chuck Norris jokes. haha. That helped break the ice and we laughed and laughed as he read each joke. I love that he had a printed paper of Chuck Norris jokes in his car. Only Josh...

We had a delicious dinner at Asian Star, which also included a lot of good conversation and then went to Mulligan's to play some miniature golf. We had a blast laughing and competing at mini golf against each other. And for the record, I was winning the entire game until the last hole.

When he took me home, he said he would like to do something again soon. I was excited and happy that he would want to see me again and this date was the best one I had been on in a long time.

It took us a year and a half after our first date to fall in love, but I wouldn't change anything about our story. We were both able to experience things, date other people and become good friends before our relationship turned into anything serious. All of those factors helped us fall in love at the right time in our lives.

I am grateful for Josh, I am grateful for our story and I look forward to all of the adventures ahead!

Dead.

2010-08-09T09:17:00.000-06:00

Our laptop is dead. A few days ago, it decided to commit suicide. Not cool. It won't turn on or show any sign of activity. boo.

I have been looking forward to blogging about some fun things like how we celebrated our one year anniversary on Friday! {I can't believe it has been one whole year already!}

Anyway, please keep your fingers crossed that we can get it fixed and hold off on getting a new computer for a little while longer. If we have to buy a new computer, that means we won't be able to book a fun trip we've been trying to plan for this fall.

Please come back to life, laptop!!!

Forgiveness

2010-07-30T18:12:00.000-06:00

Wow. Please watch this if you haven't already. Amazing. Be sure to grab a tissue!

I remember so well when this happened. The road where the accident took place is a road that I took to the U everyday. I remember seeing the flowers and the messages to the family written in sidewalk chalk under the overpass. They were there for months. I remember reading the stories in the paper about how Chris Williams forgave this young boy. What a Christ-like example he is. I am grateful for him for sharing his story with the world.

Question...

2010-07-26T19:29:00.001-06:00

So I recently changed my blog layout and I am absolutely in love with it! I think it's a keeper and I can't see myself ever wanting to change it.

Anyway, I've noticed when I view my blog on some computers, the title in the header that says, "The Meadows Family est. August 6, 2009" is not centered in the little blue frame where it belongs. I emailed the maker of the blog layout about it, and she said that some web browsers view the blog layout differently, and that is why it does that. She said they are working on getting it fixed, so hopefully it will be normal on every computer someday soon. (Keep your fingers crossed!)

I am curious to know how many of you are able to view my blog where the spacing is normal, and how many of you get the off-centered header. This is a way random request, but If you could let me know, I would appreciate it! Thanks! Love ya!

Cabin Fever

2010-07-19T23:03:00.003-06:00

This past weekend we headed up to Island Park, Idaho with some good friends for a little weekend getaway. We loved having a few days to relax and not be on any type of schedule. It was fun being up in the mountains and enjoying all of the beautiful nature-even though my allergies and nature do not get along very well.

We spent most of our time 4-wheeling, playing games and eating a whole lot of junk food. That's what cabin trips are all about!

I had my camera with me the whole time, but only took 3 pictures. I need to get in the habit of taking more pictures for when I have kids! Anyway, here are those few pictures.

Josh and I getting ready for our first 4-wheeling excursion of the trip. I laughed when he said we should take ski goggles and bandanna's, but immediately took that back when every part of my body was covered in dust except for my face!

The Crayk Family getting ready to 4-wheel. Isn't little Jaxon the cutest?

Jaxon was such a trooper the whole trip! He handled 4-wheeling and the long car rides to and from the cabin like a champ. I am determined to have a daughter that he can marry someday. :)

Some highlights of the trip include the morning that Josh woke up and was certain it was one in the afternoon and it was really nine, the many "blonde" moments by us girls and Chris falling in the camping chair onto a pair of antlers which put a hole in the chair and his pants and his garments. It was one of the funniest things ever-especially because it happened to Chris.

My favorite thing about the trip will embarrass my husband, but I'm going to say it anyway. (Please forgive me, babe!) As you can tell from the pictures, our friends James and Katie brought their one-year old son, Jaxon. Josh has always loved Jaxon, but on this trip I really got to see just how good he is with kids. He was so attentive and helpful with Jax and I loved seeing that side of him. He interacted and played with little Jaxon every chance he got. If he is that good and that cute with someone else's child, I can't even imagine what he'll be like with our own babies. It makes me look forward to motherhood even more than I already do! He will be such a great dad. I can't wait!

Thank you, Crayk family for the fun weekend! We missed the friends that couldn't make it!

Stadium of Fire!

2010-07-07T22:48:00.009-06:00

We had a fabulous holiday weekend! We went to the Oakley Rodeo with Josh's family on the 2nd and had a blast, and then the highlight of the weekend was attending the Stadium of Fire on the 3rd.

When I heard my girl Carrie Underwood was going to be the guest of honor, I knew that this was something I HAD to go to!

I went to her concert in 2008 and have wanted to see her again ever since. She is someone I admire and look up to in so many ways. She is not only (in my opinion) the most beautiful girl on the planet, but she is classy, fun and an amazing singer! She just seems like an all around good person, and I love that.

When I first got the tickets, Josh didn't think he would want to go. As it got closer, he decided to give it a shot and he ended up having a ton of fun! I think he was singing along almost as much as I was.

Before the show kicked off, they were honoring the Boy Scouts of America and had several boys there that received their Eagle. This cute old man is currently the oldest Eagle Scout and he spoke. He is in his 90's and so cute!
One of the most beautiful sunsets I've ever seen! I may not care for Provo or BYU, but I must say it is a pretty campus.

CARRIE!

Come again soon, Carrie!

And the highlight of the night...Carrie singing the National Anthem. She has got pipes! I unfortunately didn't get the very start because I was not expecting her to be the one to perform the National Anthem. I am so glad I got to hear her sing that song. Now you can too :)

Stadium of Fire is a total blast! The fireworks are seriously amazing and unlike an other firework show I have ever seen....except for when some fireworks malfunctioned and shot into the audience....Besides that, the night was amazing and probably the best 4th (well 3rd) of July I've ever had!

14 again!

2010-06-27T21:21:00.002-06:00

This past week I got to be 14 again.

I went to the Backstreet Boys concert and it did NOT disappoint!

When BSB were in their prime, I was such a huge fan. (let's be honest, I still am!) The obsession began in 9th grade. In fact, that year I created my first email address ever, which was "blondiebsb." I still have that email address and am dang proud of it.

Even though I was obsessed with BSB, I never had the opportunity to see them in concert during their glory days. Believe me, I was really sad about that.

Luckily my boys decided to come here in concert and there was NO way I was going to let myself miss out on seeing them. I talked to a few of my fellow BSB fan friends and got online the second they went on sale.

We ended up on the 13th row and had the best time! Our only complaint is that Kevin is no longer in BSB and he was a hottie. :)

Cassandra, me and Courtney

I already created a whole album on Facebook album with several pictures from the concert, so I will just add a few of my favorites and then some video of my favorite songs!

Nick Carter got HOT!

Brian was adorable as ever and his little 5 or 6 year old boy came out on stage at the start of the show to introduce the Backstreet Boys. It was too cute!

"All I Have to Give"

My favorite BSB song and Josh actually loves this song!!

"Larger Than Life"

And of course,

"I Want it That Way"

I had such a blast at the concert! I would see them again and again! And if we could get NSYNC to do a reunion tour someday, my life would be complete. :)

the birthday boy!

2010-06-15T18:21:00.003-06:00

My cute husband turned the big 2-6 this past Sunday! To stay true to blogging tradition, I would like to list 26 things I love about Joshua Anthony Meadows. :)

In no particular order:

He is just as good looking now as he was when we were 8 years old
He is extremely close with his family-which is something that was/is very important to me in a spouse.
He calls me about 10 times a day and although I find it annoying sometimes, I love that he wants to talk to me all the time.
He cuddles with me in his sleep.
He has a hot body.
He knows every word to the song, "Popular."
He is so incredibly cute and patient with our 9 Sunbeams, even though I know teaching 3 and 4 year-olds is not his ideal church calling.
He loves hanging out with my friends as much as I do.
He can always make me laugh, even when I am in the worst of moods. (he calls it an attitude adjustment! haha)
He watches Glee with me and actually enjoys it!-even though when I first started watching it, he said, "This show is so gay!"
He is probably the most patient person on the planet.
He has helped me become a better communicator.
He encourages me to share my talents and to develop new talents.
He is super athletic and hopefully our children will inherit that.
He loves my family.
He comes from an amazing family and extended family.
He loves and appreciates how girly I am.
He loves the Gospel and honors his priesthood.
He served an honorable mission.
He is a hard worker. (Right now he is working 6 days a week)
Even though he always jokes that we're never having children, I know he will be the cutest dad in the whole world!
He loves the summer and sunshine as much as I do.
As much as I dislike having an Xbox, he is dang good at it and has become good friends with some of my friend's husbands and I like that.
He always puts me first. He doesn't ever care about having a guys night or anything like that.
He tells me I'm beautiful all the time.
I know that he loves me and our future family above everything else.

I could list several more reasons, but I think this post has enough cheese to last for a loooong time! :)

I am so grateful for my amazing, hard working and handsome husband! I can't wait to celebrate many more of his birthdays with him! I love you, babe!

Mama Retires

2010-06-08T21:45:00.003-06:00

After 34 years of teaching 1st grade, my cute little mama retired last week.

34 years...wow! What an accomplishment! 34 years is a LONG time. I am so proud of my mom and so happy for her. She deserves to enjoy life and enjoy having lots of freedom.

A few weeks ago, my mom's school threw a little retirement party for her. It was pretty amazing to see several of her former students stop by and thank her for teaching them. She was very good at her job and I know she touched many lives.

My whole life, my mom has not only worked full time, but she has also managed to take care of her kids, keep the house clean, stay on top of all the laundry and ironing, make dinner and fulfill her church callings. I don't know how she has done it all these years, but I sure hope I can master doing all of those things at once someday.

Me and my mom on my wedding day!

My mom loves being a grandma, and she is excited to spend a lot more time helping out with the grandkids and future grandkids. :) I also know another little girl that will be happy to have her home more often...

our cute little dog.

Congratulations, Mom!! I love you!!

random thoughts...

2010-06-04T10:25:00.003-06:00

I have been a bad blogger lately. I often have things I want to blog about, but sometimes it's hard finding the time-especially when I would rather be spending my free time with my cute husband. However, since my blog basically doubles as my journal, I NEED to be a better blogger.

I have so many thoughts running through my head, so for now I will just list them all on here. It would take an eternity to blog about each of them separately. Enjoy.

I cannot get over how fast time goes by. Our one year anniversary is creeping up quick! It's crazy that a year ago I was busy planning my wedding. It seems like it was only a few months ago. I love being married, but sometimes I miss planning my wedding(weird, I know). I really enjoyed it!
Right now I am grateful that time passes quickly...It makes me excited for the plans we have for the future!!
I am dying to go somewhere fun and tropical.
My cute little niece Ava is turning 3 tomorrow! She is growing up too fast!
Moving out of my parent's home was not an adjustment for me at all. I was 25 and ready to get married and I love having a little place of our own. However, I do miss my cute little dog everyday. She is the cutest!
Speaking of dogs, not only am I baby hungry, but I think I am also puppy hungry. I love me a cute puppy. I love having something small and cute around to cuddle and take care of.
From now until July 4th, tickets for Wicked in San Francisco are only $40. I really want to figure out a way to make it to SF and see my favorite show. I'll NEVER get sick of it.
I absolutely love sewing! I still have so much to learn, but I really enjoy doing it. Hopefully Santa will bring me my very own sewing machine this year. :)
I want to become a runner. I love exercising and my dad was a 3 time All American runner at the U and I want to find out if I inherited any of his abilities.
Along with running, I want to get into Zumba. Some good booty shaking is my kind of workout.
Josh has to go to Iowa next week for some training for his job and I'm going to miss him a lot! It will be the longest we've been apart since we started dating.
Having a mother-in-law that does hair has got to be one of the greatest things in the world! Especially since she is dang good at it!
I got to see my childhood BFF over the weekend and it made my week! She moved to LA 6 years ago and I have only seen her twice. She is the best friend I have ever had.
Speaking of friends, I am very blessed to have great friends in my life. I love all of my girls and I don't know what I'd do without you!
I am so annoyed that the stupid Lakers and Celtics are in the NBA finals AGAIN. Seriously, the Lakers just need to go away. Everyone is sick of you, Kobe!
If the Jazz trade Korver, I am going to be one sad little girl.
I am so glad it finally feels like summer outside. I just wish I could be by a pool everyday instead of cooped up inside of an office. The joys of working full time.
Someone recently asked me what I like about my job....and I couldn't really come up with anything. Sad, huh? I would really like to find something that I love so that I don't hate life from 8-5 M-F. If any of you have suggestions for me, please let me know.
I had the opportunity to sing in church on Sunday and I really love performing. I wish I could do stuff like that more often.
Glee is one of the best things that has happened to television in a long time. The music is phenomenal and Lea Michelle has one of the best female voices I've ever heard.
Summertime always reminds me of EFY. I went twice as a teenager and spent 3 summers as a counselor. It was one of the greatest things I have ever done and I miss it. (alright alright alright alright alright hey!)
It's so sad and frustrating watching someone you care about make lots of bad decisions...I watched a brother be that way for most of my life and now seeing another person close to me do the same type of thing just breaks my heart. Why do smart people have to make so many stupid choices??
I have a huge desire to go to Disneyland....I haven't been in 8 years and I miss it. I turn into a 6-year-old girl when I go there.
This season of American Idol was a joke. Seriously, I did not enjoy it at all. It will definitely fail next year with the one and only Simon Cowell gone.
I love life and am very grateful for my many blessings.

And there you have it folks. Now you know what goes on in my brain. :)

getting my craft on!

2010-05-18T22:30:00.004-06:00

Lately I have been bitten by a craft bug!

Seriously, I love doing crafts. I wish I could have one day a week completely devoted to doing crafts. In my spare time, I love looking at craft blogs to help me get ideas of what to do in the future.

My only problem is that I am extremely OCD and a total perfectionist when I am working on something, so sometimes crafting is very frustrating for me. I want everything to turn out perfect! At some point, I just have to be content with the fact that I tried my best.

Anyway, for Christmas my in-laws gave me sewing lessons and to say I have enjoyed them would be an understatement- I have absolutely loved every minute of it!! I have always wanted to learn how to sew, so this was the perfect gift for me.

Here are some of my projects...

First up, chair cushions for our kitchen table chairs. I love our table and chairs and want to make them last as long as possible. I had been looking for some cushions for a while, but never found any that I liked, or if I found one I liked, the store wouldn't have enough of them. A few weeks into my sewing class, I had a brilliant idea to make my own cushions!

I am really happy with how they turned out! I made 4 chair cushions and then I also just finished a matching cushion to go on the bench that goes with our table.

I love love love the fabric I found!! Here it is up close.

My most recent project was a window valance to go with our bedroom set. Here is our bedding, courtesy of the best store ever, Target!

When we got our bedding last summer, they didn't have anything for windows to go with it. A few months ago while browsing Target.com, I discovered they had just come out with either a window valance or a window panel to go with our set. Unfortunately, the valance was way too small for our window. I would have needed 3 valances for our one window, so I decided to improvise. I ordered the window panel and made my own valance in my sewing class. I wanted to add a little something extra to it, so I bought some black fabric to add to the bottom, and voila! A window valance! I love having something on our window. It totally completes our bedroom.

(Don't you love the brownish blinds! :) Gotta love apartment living!)

Next on the agenda in my sewing class....a skirt for myself and possibly some throw pillows for our bed!

Better luck next season, Jazz....

2010-05-13T22:13:00.001-06:00

Oh I am so behind on blogging. There are so many things I have wanted to blog about lately, but I have always found other exciting things to do like ironing or cooking or cleaning or doing laundry. Hopefully I'll get around to blogging more often since this blog practically doubles as my journal. Have I mentioned that I am terrible about writing in my journal? Well, I am.

Anyway, this post is so two weeks ago, but I am blogging about it anyway because about 2 weeks ago, one of my dreams came true...

I attended a Jazz playoff game!!

We were offered tickets just a few short hours before the game(thank you, Bolerjacks!!) and it was such a blast! I had been trying to win tickets all day for this game, but was unsuccessful. When Josh called to tell me we had tickets, I thought he was joking! The boy LOVES to tease, so sometimes it's hard to know when he's being serious. :)

Anywho, it was a great game and what made it even better is that our win that night knocked the Thuggs out of the playoffs. The Nuggets are one of my least favorite teams in the NBA. They fall second behind the Lakers on my "least favorite" list.

Here are some pictures of our fun filled night!

I love my Jazz!

I love the mini Jazz bear! SO FUNNY!

I love that his number is "1/2"

The regular Jazz bear is pretty funny too

My lover....Korver, NOT Birdman or Fes...ew

Me and my real lover. Not the best picture, but whatev.

We also bought jerseys that night!! Josh got a throw back D-Will jersey and I got an old school Stockton jersey. John Stockton has always been my favorite player and I was so excited when they started making his jerseys again! And you wanna know a secret?? We bought youth sized jerseys! They run so big and they are almost half the price of the adult ones. SCORE!

We are sad that Jazz season is over. I miss watching games a few nights a week. Seriously, I. love. the. Jazz-always have. I am anxious to see what happens over the next few months with so many free agents on the team and what draft picks we end up with. Hopefully we can pick up a good center. That's what the team really needs! And if Korver leaves, I will shed tears. Lots and lots of tears. But if Fesenko and Kofous go, I will shed tears of pure JOY. Also, the Jazz will be getting new uniforms. Can't wait to see what they look like! Hopefully the Jazz will have better luck next year. I think Jerry deserves a ring. So does D-Will.

Oh and I guess go Suns!! I will cheer for ANY team that plays against the Lakers. Kobe Bryant is probably my least favorite person on the planet.

So inspiring!

2010-05-06T17:45:00.001-06:00

I know I'm not the first person to post this video on a blog, but I wanted to share it with any of you that might not have seen it.

On Tuesday I was home with a violent case of the stomach flu and saw this video for the first time. I was feeling absolutely miserable and having a little pity party for myself until I saw this video. I was immediately humbled and reminded that the stomach flu really isn't that bad.

If you haven't read Stephanie Nielson's blog, you should probably check it out. You have to read back a ways to know the whole story, but believe me, it will be worth your time. She is such an inspiration and helps me remember to be thankful for my blessings. I hope I can have her kind of strength when I am faced with trials in my life.

ghetto no more!

2010-04-21T18:18:00.001-06:00

We recently made a HUGE improvement to our little living room.

Soon after we got married, we found a steal of a deal on an awesome tv. We purchased it, but could not afford a tv stand at the time. So we settled for this:

Can anyone say GHETTO?? I would seriously cringe every time I saw it. I was almost embarassed to have people over because I hated how it looked.

But considering that we were(still are) poor newlyweds, we just dealt with it and knew eventually we would have something better than 2 stools to put our tv on.

Uncle Sam was good to us, so we decided to use some of our tax return to purchase a tv stand. We searched EVERYWHERE! RC Willey, John Paras, Downeast Home, RC Willey Outlet, Ashley Furniture, KSL, etc.

We saw several we liked, but they were all too expensive. We weren't about to spend $600 on a tv stand, no matter how much we liked it. It's not worth it when you live in an apartment and don't know what your future living arrangements will be.

One day while Josh was in Wal-Mart, he found this:

Upgrade? I think so.

It was a great find, and was under $150! It's definitely not the highest quality tv stand around, but it looks good and it works perfect for us for now!

Thank you, Wal-Mart.

why I love our church calling

2010-04-13T10:18:00.003-06:00

As I've mentioned before, Josh and I are the Sunbeam teachers in our ward.

We have 9(yes you heard right) darling 3 & 4 year-olds that we teach each Sunday.

While they do keep our hands full, they really could not be ANY cuter! I love them all so much.

For some reason, they were as cute as ever this past Sunday.

Here are some examples of their cuteness:

*A little boy in the CTR 4 class gave the opening prayer in primary. In his prayer, he said something along the lines of, "please bless us that we won't hit and scratch people." It was so funny and cute. A member of the bishopric came in to give a message on prayer, and in his message, he mentioned this boy's prayer and how it is good to pray for things like that. A little boy in our class said, "Sometimes my brother makes me so mad and I want to hit him and sometimes I make him mad and he wants to hit me but we're not supposed to." Josh and I were so impressed that this little 3 year-old boy was listening to the message and understood what he was saying. Adorable.

*There is a little boy in our class who is really good at throwing tantrums. He usually cries at least 4-5 times during class each Sunday. As we were working on a coloring project in our class, he started crying for some reason and this cute little girl gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek! It was so darling. Another little girl saw this girl do that and decided she should kiss him too. She was standing behind him and decided to kiss his shoulder. He's only 3 and he's already a ladies man!

*The same little boy from the first story gave the closing prayer in our class. In his prayer he said, "Please bless the baby giraffe that died at the zoo." A cute baby giraffe was born at the Hogle Zoo this past summer and recently passed away. I thought it was so cute that he prayed for that giraffe. Josh later told me that during primary, this little boy told him about the baby giraffe and that it had died. He also told Josh that the giraffe was now resurrected and had a perfect body now. How cute is that?? His parents are obviously doing a great job of taking every opportunity to teach this boy about the Gospel. That is the type of parent I hope to be.

*There is this little blue-eyed blonde girl in our class who is one of the most beautiful little girls I've ever seen. (I would like my future daughter to look just like her) :) She is kind of full of it sometimes, but she is as cute as can be. She always waves to me and Josh multiple times during Sacrament meeting and on Sunday after Sacrament meeting was over, she just walked up to us and put her arms up and wanted us to pick her up. It was adorable. She is a little princess.

I could go on and on about all the cute things they do. They are so innocent and full of life. We are very blessed to be their teachers.

some much needed vitamin D!

2010-04-06T23:03:00.001-06:00

We recently returned from a much needed vacation in St. George. There really are no words to describe how much I LOVE St. George. I love the palm trees, red rocks and warm(er) weather. I think I am supposed to live there someday!

We went down with our friends Ty and Lauren, and a bunch of our other friends were down there as well so it was fun to hang out with everyone. The weather was not quite what the forecast had predicted, but it was still warm enough to come home with some tan lines-and this girl LOVES having tan lines!!

We spent our trip sleeping in, laying out by the pool, getting smoothies from Orange Peel, shopping and spending a day in Las Vegas! We had a blast!

Anywho, even though I had my camera with me the entire time, I hardly took any pictures. I guess we'll just have to go again soon then! :) Here are the pics I did take:

I know, I know, they look like cross dressers or something. I was on the hunt for some cute, cheap black flip flops and while we stopped in Payless, Josh and Ty hollered for us to come over to where they were....I am glad they can now appreciate the talent it takes to walk in heels!

We saw this sweet Lamborghini in the mall parking lot in Vegas.

Ty and Lauren

Me and my honey

I have always wanted to go to Serendipity in New York and try the world famous frozen hot chocolate. I recently heard that they had opened one in Vegas, so we went there for dessert! It was better than I imagined!! SOOO tasty!

St. George, I hope to see you again soon!! xoxoxo

A Legally Blonde Birthday!!

2010-04-05T22:41:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago, I turned the big 2-6{gasp!} Even though I wasn't excited about the age I was turning, I had an awesome birthday!

Thank you, everyone for the sweet birthday texts, calls and Facebook messages! I am so blessed to have such great people in my life!

As you all know, the night of my birthday, we saw Legally Blonde: The Musical!

It was the perfect thing to do on my birthday(well, seeing Wicked could beat it). It wasn't quite as good as I had hoped, but I still liked it a lot and am really glad I saw it!! The movie is still WAY better, but the musical did include some of my favorite lines from the movie, so that was fun!

Lines like, "I totally forgot you go here," "Woods, comma, Elle," and of course, "Whoever said tangerine was the new pink, was seriously disturbed!" (in the movie she says "orange" instead of tangerine!)

Here I am in the theater with my goofy husband :)

And here I am outside of the theatre! I still can't believe opening night was on my birthday!!

Birthdays are my favorite.

the joke's on josh!!!

2010-04-01T23:25:00.004-06:00

I had a VERY successful April Fool's Day!!

I must say, I am quite proud of myself!

I had been planning this for a while, because Josh got me GOOD last year! Before I tell my April Fool's joke on Josh, I will tell you what he did to me last year!

Last year on the night before April Fool's Day, we had a long conversation about getting married and when we wanted to get married, etc. I went home feeling happy and excited for what was in store. {Also that night, Josh had told me about a position that had opened up at Aspen Ridge(where he currently works) and he had had an unofficial interview for it earlier that day.}

The next morning, he called me while I was getting ready for work and told me he had good news AND bad news.

The good news was that he had been offered that job. {Lie #1}

BUT

The bad news was that he had to go to Arizona for a month for training. {I easily believed him because I knew the company had a facility in Arizona}

I acted as happy and supportive as I could on the phone, but deep down I was extremely sad that he was going to be gone for a month-especially after the big marriage conversation we had the night before. How would this affect our marriage plans? Would he still want to marry me after he got back from Arizona??

We ended the conversation and I headed to work, fighting tears the entire time. A little while into work, I checked my phone and saw that Josh had called about 5 times. I snuck down into the stairway and called him back. He immediately said, "APRIL FOOLS!!!"

I was SO relieved!! Ever since then, I have had a plan to get him back! Josh is constantly tricking me, so it was time for some sweet revenge!!

The timing and everything about this trick was PERFECT!

This morning Josh received a text with this picture:

Along with the picture I said,

"Surprise!! I stopped at the store this morning and bought another test!!! ahhhhhh!!!"

{This may be too much information, but I completely skipped my cycle last month and really did take 2 pregnancy tests this week-which both immediately came up NEGATIVE. Don't worry, I am NOT pregnant and you won't hear a baby announcement from us for a while. I am still on the pill and NO! That is not an April Fool's joke!}

Last night while we were talking in bed, I told Josh I was going to take one more pregnancy test the next day, just to be sure! (The timing of my April Fool's joke could not have been better!)

Anyway, when I got to work, I went to Google Images and typed in "Positive Pregnancy Test." I took a picture of the picture with my phone, and sent the text.

A little while later, I get a call from Josh at work. I could immediately hear the panic in his voice. I wish I could remember exactly what he said, but it was somewhere along the lines of, "Oh my gosh! Are you serious? Is that picture for real? We can't be pregnant! etc, etc."

My original plan was to get him going on this all day.

However....I have a HORRIBLE poker face and cannot tell a lie to save my life, so after a few minutes of his freaking out, I busted up laughing and yelled, "APRIL FOOLS!!"

It. Was. Awesome.

He totally fell for it and I was finally able to trick my husband.

Allison 1. Josh 0. (For 2010 at least)

Also, every year on April Fool's, I am reminded of an April Fool's joke that was played on me on Concert Choir tour Junior year by two of my good friends. It is a GREAT story, and would blog about it if I could keep my eyes open for 5 more minutes, but I don't think I can. I will have to tell it sometime though. They got me good!

Natalie and Shawna....prepare to get punked!!! haha. :)

hallelujah!

2010-03-29T20:57:00.001-06:00

After several months of applying for SEVERAL jobs, my cute Joshua was FINALLY offered a full-time job!!

YAYYYYYYY!!!!!

We are so happy and so grateful that something has finally worked out!

We don't know the specifics of the job, or his exact start date just yet, but I feel so incredibly happy and grateful that he will have this opportunity.

He will be working for Wells Fargo Financial as a Sales Credit Manager. Banking and finance has always been something that Josh has been interested in, so this position will be a good start for him.

If law school doesn't work out for us, it is nice to know that he has a good job, with a big company that will have lots of opportunity for growth.

I am so grateful for my hard working husband and am grateful to my Heavenly Father for answering our prayers!

quick little post!

2010-03-22T23:21:00.001-06:00

I thought I would make a quick little post! It's been a fun few days! And we've got a lot of fun days ahead of us this week and I knew if I didn't blog about this now, I would have too much to blog about next week!

Anyway, last week I went to the Jazz game with my good friend, Karen, aka, Chochie! We LOVE the Jazz and we LOVE #26....

It was his birthday on St. Patrick's day and we went to the game on his birthday last year, so we thought we should keep the tradition alive! We bought from scalpers and wound up on the 14th row!! Steal of a deal, I tell ya!

We made a similar poster last year, but this year we made it on the jumbtron. No biggie.

He is definitely the most attractive player in the NBA!

St. Patrick's Day must be this guy's favorite Holiday!

On Sunday we had my birthday dinner with my family and my cute cousins and their significant others came up from BYU for dinner! I LOVE this girl!!

We went for the Prom pose in this pic...not sure why....And if my cousin's boy looks familiar, he may or may not play basketball for BYU....

I had a blast seeing my cousins. They are like siblings to me! It was a fun start to a fun week!

Keep your fingers crossed for me that I don't have a mid-twenties crisis. I am so not excited about turning the age I am about to turn. barf.

But my birthday should be a fun day! Legally Blonde: The Musical, baby!

And then we are off to sunny St. George for some much needed R & R!!! Can't wait!

Love you all!

one year ago today....

2010-03-16T22:43:00.001-06:00

...Josh told me that he loved me for the first time.

I still remember that moment very well.

We had gone to dinner with my parents, and then he and I went down to The Gateway to play Josh's favorite arcade game: Final Furlong-you know, that horse racing game!

After he beat me several times, we decided to head home.

As he walked me to the door, we hugged, kissed, talked, etc and after a few minutes, he said something along the lines of, "Allison, there's something I want to tell you. I am so happy dating you and I love you. I am so stoked about us and I can see wedding bells in our future."

The moment was perfect and so adorable. I told him I loved him too, because I knew I did, but had been waiting for him to say it first. I went inside my house beaming from ear to ear and couldn't stop thinking about how my life was going to change forever!

This picture was taken right around that time.

I will never forget that moment.

A few weeks later, we set a wedding date and called the Salt Lake Temple to reserve a sealing room. A little over a month later, we were "officially" engaged and married 3 months after that.

Like Colbie and Jason sing, "I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend."

I truly am.

It's the most wonderful time of the year!!!

2010-03-02T22:12:00.003-07:00

Well, at least in my opinion it is!

There is just something about this time of the year that I love!! As soon as March hits, I am instantly in a better mood.

I love that March means Spring is finally on its way and the long, yucky Winter months are behind us. The temperatures start to get a little warmer, it stays light outside a little longer. Ah! I love it!

Even though Summer is hands down my favorite season, this is my favorite time of year-if that makes any sense. I love knowing that most of the cold days are over{hopefully} and I love that it is only a matter of weeks until the trees and flowers start to bloom.

To me, Spring means a fresh start. Everything seems to come back to life and the sun is out a lot more.

It brings me so much joy knowing that Summer is only a few short months away! I just hope we don't have a June like we did last year. yuck!

Anyway, probably my favorite thing about this time of year is that I can purchase these bad boys.....

Yep, the Cadbury Mini Egg! Oh they are heaven! I have loved them for as long as I can remember. My mom always has a bag hidden somewhere in the kitchen this time of year and I have always been able to find them. :)

And I may or may not have consumed an entire large bag in 2 days at work....I have a serious addiction. But they are only around for a small amount of time, so I've got to take advantage, right?? They are delectable! And I've got Josh hooked on them now! go me!

Also, this month is BIRTHDAY month!! YAY!! But I do feel as though I am on the verge of a mid-twenties crisis. I do NOT want to turn the age that I'm about to turn. yikes!

the jackpot.

2010-02-27T13:10:00.007-07:00

This past week we spent a lot of time with Josh's extended family after the passing of his step-grandpa, Gary. Funerals are never the preferred reason for getting the family all together, but family is one of the things that helps the most when going through a sad time.

I have always known I married into a great family, but this week I truly realized that I hit the JACKPOT when it comes to in-laws. Josh is the oldest cousin in his extended family, so there are tons of cousins close to our age and just a little younger. I grew up being right in the middle of all the grandkids, and while I am close with several of my cousins, I never had a cousin close to my age.

It is definitely an interesting experience gaining a second family when you get married. I was a little worried that I would have a hard time not being with my family the whole time on holidays, but it was a much smoother transition than I expected. I seriously love Josh's immediate family, and all of his aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents. They have all welcomed me into the family with open arms. I do not know how I got so lucky, but I am forever grateful.

I feel so blessed to have married into such a great family. I feel almost as comfortable around Josh's family as I do my own. And I must say that another reason why Josh and I were meant for each other is because I don't know if very many girls would be able to handle marrying into a family of 5 boys. haha. Growing up with only older brothers, I have had to learn to tolerate being teased constantly and how to hold my own. Having those qualities is a necessity if you marry into the Meadows family! :)

My cute little grandma

2010-02-23T23:06:00.002-07:00

I don't mean to brag, but I probably have the cutest and littlest grandma of all time! She is so adorable and I love her so much!

She turned 90 years old this past Saturday. It's crazy to think that she is only 10 years away from turning 100. She has gotten to be pretty funny in her old age, but we are glad she is still plugging along.

I have grown up only a few minutes away from my grandparents, so I have always had a really close relationship with them. They have always been so good to me and shown me so much love. I hope to be that kind of grandparent someday.

I think my grandparents were worried there for a few years that I would never get married. They would tell me all the time that every night they would pray that I would find someone. Bless their hearts. Also, my grandma has always had a big crush on the boys that I've dated. She thinks Josh has the prettiest eyes. haha. She is so cute! I am so grateful and happy that my grandma and grandpa were both able to come to my wedding. It meant so much to me.

I am so grateful to have such amazing and loving grandparents and I know I will be a mess when they are gone. I love them so much!

Our family had a little party for my grandma on Sunday night. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but here is a picture of me and my grandparents on Christmas 2 years ago.

This can give you an idea of how little she is! (plus if you've ever met my mom, you will understand where she got her height from) I am about 5'5" and standing flat footed in this picture. My grandparents are SO adorable!!

a belated valentine's post!

2010-02-23T22:38:00.007-07:00

I know, I know...I'm about a week and a half behind on this post, but I wanted to blog about Valentine's Day for my memory's sake.

Josh and I had a very fun, but very low key and relaxing Valentine's Day weekend. We saw the movie, "Valentine's Day" with our friends Ty and Lauren on that Friday night, and then celebrated our Valentine's Day on Saturday night. It's always weird when a holiday falls on a Sunday.

Anyway, we had planned to go to Desert Star Playhouse for our Valentine's date, but we called too late and they were sold out. I wanted to do something fun and meaningful, so I decided to make Josh his favorite meal; which is salmon and red rice and beans. His mom makes it and it is soooooo good! So I had my first experience with cooking fish and I must say, it turned out very well! :)

After we ate, we enjoyed several episodes of Prison Break. It was very fun and relaxing and nice to just spend a night at home together.

I sure love my Valentine!

(I didn't take any pictures on Valentine's Day, so an engagement pic will have to do!)

I think Valentine's Day can be such a weird/awkward holiday if you are dating someone and are unsure of where things stand. The holiday gets so much hype, but shouldn't we always show love to the people we love??

However, I must say that Valentine's day does hold a special place in my heart now. Let's flash back to Valentine's Day 2009...That was the first night I realized that Josh really did like me a lot.

Josh and I were dating quite consistently, but I still wasn't 100% sure where things stood. It was probably because I was still recovering from having my heart ripped out of my chest only 6 months before that. I was really liking Josh, (I always had) but was terrified to let myself fall for him or even believe that he really liked me.

Anyway, Josh had asked me out for Valentine's Day and I was super stoked! But I was debating the whole time whether or not I should get him a gift. What on earth do you get a guy for Valentine's Day? Especially when you are only dating? My parents were out of town and I remember calling my mom the morning of Valentine's Day asking her advice. She said it would probably be okay if I didn't get him anything. I didn't worry about it, but was worried about how I would feel if he got me something.

He showed up empty handed and I was so relieved! We had a fun dinner at Bonsai with Chris and Shianne, and then got some ice cream and watched a movie. I was so glad that I didn't have to feel guilty for not getting him anything since he didn't get me anything-or so I thought.

As we pulled up to my house at the end of the night, we were sitting in his truck talking and kissing and then he reached in the back and handed me a little red bag. I.was.shocked. Inside was a bottle of Ed Hardy perfume!! I immediately felt awful that I hadn't gotten him anything, but it was then that I knew Josh really liked me. I knew Josh well enough to know that he wouldn't do something like that for a girl unless he really liked her. I was one happy girl that night! I could hardly sleep and couldn't wait to call my mom in the morning to tell her.

It was a very cute and thoughtful gift and I love to wear that perfume!

Ever since then, Josh has teased me about not getting him anything for Valentine's Day. haha. I think I made up for it this year though by cooking his favorite meal on a Saturday night! I never cook on the weekends! Our Valentine's Day gifts to each other were new cellphones-which I might add are the bomb dot com. Can't wait for many more Valentine's Days with my honey.

Valentine's Day 2009.

makes me smile

2010-02-19T15:10:00.002-07:00

Today has been one of the worst days of work EVER!

The only good thing about this day so far is the fact that it is FRIDAY.

I took a little break from my frustrations to watch this video. It always turns my frown upside down.

I hope it can put a smile on your face as well!

She is the funniest and most over the top Galinda I have ever seen. She's hilarious!

I love Wicked with all my heart. But you already knew that!

bend and snap!

2010-02-15T23:13:00.015-07:00

My birthday present to myself came in the mail the other day!!!

That's right folks, Legally Blonde The Musical is coming to town on MY birthday!! What are the odds that opening night is on March 23, my actual day of birth?? Those of you that know me well are fully aware that Legally Blonde is my favorite movie(well, it's tied with The Wizard of Oz), so you can only imagine my excitement when I learned that it was coming to SLC on my birthday! I can't think of anything more appropriate than Legally Blonde on my birthday! (Actually, Wicked could maybe beat it but either one works for me!) Elle Woods is my idol! haha. For reals though.

I am a little ticked though because the tickets were originally supposed to go on sale on February 8th. February 8th rolls around and I jump online to purchase my tickets, only to discover that they had changed the date to January 15th!!! Almost a month earlier!!! Luckily, some tickets were still available but our seats aren't as good as I had hoped, but in the long run, it probably saved us some $$$! The better the seats are the more it costs. I am still just as excited as I could possibly be!

Speaking of my birthday, my dear sweet Joshua always complains that he never knows what to get me for Christmas, birthdays, etc... Since I know he reads this blog, I will publicly make him a list of suggestions so that he can't say he didn't know what to get. :) (babe, I know we are poor, so I don't expect much, and I know I won't get most of what is on my list, but a girl can dream!)

Michael Buble tickets - This is way far fetched because the concert is sold out, but Michael is my favorite performer and I LOVE him! I would give just about anything to go to his concert.
Skinny Jeans from Buckle - You can get my size from my other Buckle jeans in my closet :)
This Is It - The Michael Jackson movie. You know how I love MJ!
A Pedicure - I know you love it when my toes are polished and cute!
Cute Spring Clothes
Mac Eye Shadows - Whitney could give you good suggestions!!
The soundtrack for Legally Blonde The Musical - You know I will want that after we see it!
This decoration - I know Halloween is a ways away, but I am in LOVE with this. I NEED IT!
A gym pass
And my biggest birthday wish is that my cute boy will find a good, full-time job VERY soon!

la caille

2010-02-10T22:26:00.011-07:00

On Saturday, February 6th, Josh and I were able to have a nice dinner at La Caille. My cute grandpa who is just months shy of turning 90, gave Josh a gift certificate to La Caille to thank him for mowing his lawn for him this fall. My grandpa does not act like a typical 89 year-old by any means, and had been mowing his own lawn up until this past fall when his lawn mower got stolen out of his garage! Who steals an elderly man's lawn mower?? Anyway, my grandpa figured that at 89, he didn't really need to buy a new lawn mower, and since Josh does yard care on the side, he asked if Josh would mow his lawn for him. Of course Josh wouldn't let him pay him, so my grandpa gave him a gift certificate to La Caille, which just happened to be enough for dinner for two. (Someone had given it to him, but at this age, he wasn't going to use it)

The certificate was going to expire in April, so we tried to think of a fun day to use it. We picked February 6 because it was a Saturday and also our 6 month anniversary!! I cannot believe it has already been 6 months! They have been the best 6 months of my life.

Here are some pictures of our evening...

My chicken entree...yum!

Josh's delicious salmon

When Josh called to make the reservation, they asked if we were celebrating anything special, and he told him it was our anniversary-which in a way it was. When they brought out our desserts, Josh's chocolate cake had a giant sparkler in it to celebrate the occasion.

It lasted for several minutes!

(by the way, Josh is so dang cute!)

My Creme Brulee...TO DIE FOR! I ate every bite!

I had to include this picture even though it is blurry. Check out the walrus(?) and his sweet hat above us!

It is crazy how fast these 6 months have gone by. Josh and I have learned so much about each other and have grown so much already. I hope we can continue to learn and grow together! Marriage teaches you so much about patience, selflessness, love, devotion etc. It isn't always easy, in fact sometimes marriage is very hard. Living with someone is a whole lot different than dating them or being engaged to them, but it is definitely worth it. There is nothing better than coming home to someone that loves you and always having someone there to support you in everything. I look forward to all of the good times and trials ahead.

6 months down, eternity to go!

I love you, Joshua!

Baby Claire

2010-02-06T12:23:00.051-07:00

Meet the newest member of the Bringhurst Family...

Claire Kristi Bringhurst

January 31, 2010

2:10 p.m.

7 lbs. 3 oz., 19 inches long

Do you know what's better than having one niece? Having two of them! I love being an aunt and am so grateful that these little girls are a part of my life. I love both of my nieces so much!

Claire was born Sunday, January 31, 2010. My mom and I were lucky enough to go into the delivery room only minutes after she was born. There is nothing better than seeing and holding a newborn baby. It's so amazing to know they are fresh from Heaven and you can just feel their sweet little spirits. I can't even imagine what it will be like when I hold my own babies for the first time. I can't wait for that day.

Here is big sister Ava seeing baby Claire for the first time. They don't allow anyone under the age of 14 in the hospital rooms anymore, so Ava could only see baby sister through the nursery window. Ava loves Claire, but is having a hard time learning how to share the spotlight. :)

I am convinced that this was the first time Josh has ever held a newborn baby girl. He is going to be such a cute daddy someday!

I LOVE my new niece! But I do NOT love this picture of me. Hey-we had 9 sunbeams in our class that day!! Crazy.

Oh I love her so much! She is absolutely perfect!

Somebody please make the baby hunger go away! At least for a little while longer! ah!

a shout out!

2010-01-30T12:06:00.004-07:00

I just wanted to give a shout out to my amazing voice teacher, the lovely Lisa Olsen!

The other day I realized it has been 3 years this month since I started taking voice lessons with her. I can't believe it has been that long! Time flies when you're having fun!!

Singing has always been my favorite thing to do. From elementary school through high school, I was always involved in some sort of choir. Once college hit, I began missing it so much! Car singing and the occasional solo in church just wasn't cutting it for me.

A few years ago I decided to do something about it-and you know what they say, if you don't use it, you LOSE it! I started looking for a voice teacher, and thanks to my wonderful friend and neighbor, Kenneth Cope, I was introduced to Lisa. She had been his assistant several years ago and had recently emailed him to say that she was going to start teaching voice lessons. It was meant to be!

We instantly became good friends and my 1/2 hour lessons would usually turn into hour lessons because we would chat so much! Lisa has taught me so much and has given me so much confidence in my voice. She is one of my closest friends and is the older sister I never had! I am so grateful for her friendship and I am so happy she is part of my life. Lisa has such an amazing voice and seriously needs to record an album. I hope someday I can sing as well as she does!

Anyway, I just wanted to let Lisa know how awesome she is and how much I love her!

I'm so in love....

2010-01-30T11:53:00.002-07:00

with these shoes!!!

I saw these at Nordstrom a few weeks ago and instantly fell in love!! They have my name written all over them! It is a DANG good thing these weren't out before the wedding or else I would've been in the hole nearly $300! (I did love my wedding shoes though and I got them for only $13 at Nordstrom Rack) I love love LOVE these Badgley Mischkas!! If I were Carrie Underwood, I would totally rock these on the red carpet at the Grammy's tomorrow. And if I had an extra $300 lying around, they would be mine! I don't know where I would wear them, but I would come up with something!! :)

Just thought I would throw that out there.... haha

Go Jazz Go!!

2010-01-21T22:26:00.004-07:00

My company has 2 season tickets for the Jazz. On Saturday, I was lucky enough to score the tickets for the game. They are awesome seats! 10th row behind the bench! Perfect view of my boyfriend, Kyle. (Don't worry, Josh knows about me and Kyle) :)

Josh and I were so excited to have the opportunity to go to a game-especially with such great seats! We are both HUGE Jazz fans, and I love that we were able to do something fun together that we both enjoy and are passionate about. I must say, the Jazz had a rough start to this season, but they seemed to have stepped up their game lately! (Knock on wood) The game against the Spurs last night was AMAZING!!! So proud of our Jazz!!

And I must mention my new favorite player....SUNDIATA GAINES!!!

(Please let the Jazz sign him!)

We were way bummed that he didn't get more playing time at the game on Saturday. During the 4th quarter, several people in the crowd started chanting his name and when he was finally put in during the last minute, he got a standing "O!" He got the biggest grin on his face. I heart him.

What I would have given to be at the game against the Cavaliers last Thursday. Josh and I were watching the game with some friends, and the Jazz were down by about 5 points, with only 40 seconds or so left in the game, so we figured it was a lost cause and decided to head home. BIG MISTAKE!! What a victory!! All thanks to Mr. Gaines and his game winning shot! The next morning I watched the clip of his shot over and over again. What an exciting moment for him. It reminded me of another similar moment in Jazz history.....The game that John Stockton sent the Utah Jazz to the NBA finals!! I'll never forget watching that game with my dad and both of us jumping up with excitement and high fiving each other. Oh that was awesome. John Stockton is still my favorite Jazz player of all time! I love that they are selling his jerseys again! I REALLY want one for my birthday(hint hint, honey!)

I sure love spending time with this cute boy.

January = BLAH!!

2010-01-17T19:34:00.005-07:00

I don't know about the rest of you, but January is BY FAR my least favorite month of the year. The only word to describe the month is "BLAH." I LOATHE everything about January.(Loathing! Unadulterated Loathing!) The holidays have just ended, it's freezing cold everyday and the air is absolutely disgusting!! My allergies are not handling this smog very well at all. I don't really care for the snow-especially if I have to drive in it, but I would really appreciate a good snow storm right about now so that I can breathe properly again!! Or I wouldn't mind heading to this place....

I have decided that someday we are going to go somewhere warm during the month of January. Maybe next year?? I need to have something to look forward to in this "blah" of a month. I feel like I am on the verge of getting seasonal depression, and a warm vacation would be the perfect cure for that. What I would give to feel some warm sunshine on my skin right now. Or I need to plan it just right so that one of our kids is born in January. That will make the month a little more exciting for me. :)

But until then, I will be dreaming of my favorite place on Earth.....

And continue to hope that our goal of living in St. George someday will actually happen!! Winter is not our friend!

I'll be a SUNBEAM for Him!!

2010-01-11T19:19:00.005-07:00

Josh and I just got a church calling....

If you haven't guessed it by now, we are the new Sunbeam teachers in our ward!! We have taught our first two lessons, and I absolutely love it! We have 8 of the cutest 3 and 4 year-olds around. Seriously, they are all adorable! And for the most part, they are all good natured children, which is a huge help considering there are 8 of them. There is this one little blonde girl that I want to take home with me. She is pretty much the epitome of what I want our future daughter to look like-blonde hair,big blue eyes and an adorable little face. I would pretty much keep any of the kids in the class though. Josh wasn't too sure if he would enjoy this calling, but he loves it! (Babe-don't kill me for stating the truth!) :)

I thought this calling would be good birth control for me, but it is having quite the opposite affect. I love noticing how much these young kids love and adore their parents. They talk about them during the lesson and their little faces light up when their parents come to get them after class. Last Sunday we had one little straggler who's parents hadn't come and gotten him yet. We started walking down the hall with him and found his dad, and as soon as his dad picked him up, he exclaimed, "I love you, Daddy!" There is nothing cuter than hearing those words. I can't wait for the day that our kids say those 3 words to us. It will be heaven.

Nothin like a good neighbor!

2010-01-05T11:06:00.002-07:00

I'm sad. Our good friends and neighbors will be moving out of our apartment complex at the end of the month. I have known both Tiare and James since high school and Tiare is one of my dearest friends. It has been so fun living above them the past 5 months. We have had many meals together and watched several episodes of The Office and Prison Break together. They aren't moving far, but there's just nothing like having good friends that are also good neighbors.

So this is where you come in. Josh and I aren't looking to "replace" James and Tiare, because like I said, they aren't moving far and they are our good friends. BUT-we would like to find a nice couple to move into their apartment.

I must say, our apartment complex is AWESOME!! Josh and I looked at SO many places and this was by far the best deal for our money. It has 2 bedrooms(with big closets in both), 1 1/2 bathrooms, a decent sized kitchen (for an apartment), a dishwasher, a HUGE laundry room with lots of extra storage space, central air, covered parking for EVERYONE and it is only $675 a month!! You only have to sign a 6 month lease, and after that, you just pay month to month and your rent stays at $675. That is almost unheard of in the apartment world. It is also in a great location: approximately 4500 South and Highland Drive. The apartment complex is also part of an amazing ward! The management is awesome and we love where we live.

So, are you sold yet? :)

If you or anyone you know is looking for a place, let me know and I will give you the apartment manager's number!! I promise you it is a great place to live!

Our First Christmas!

2009-12-31T18:48:00.024-07:00

We had a great first Christmas together! It was a little hectic trying to sort out the family stuff, but as soon as Christmas Day rolled around, everything worked out great! Even though we felt like our day was like the movie, "Four Christmases." We were back and forth with each other's families all day but it was well worth it! We had a blast!

Now I know you're dying to know what we got for Christmas, so I will show you some of the goods in pictures :) We were so spoiled!!

My parent's gave us this cute Kitchenaid as our main gift! I have always wanted a Kitchenaid, so it was nice of them do get that for us. I know what you're thinking....She didn't get the pink one?? Of course I wanted it, and would've loved it, but then I thought it would be better to go with something that would match our kitchen. (See picture below)

These were not a Christmas present, but these canisters sit on our counter and go with our dishes that I absolutely love. Now you can see why I chose the color that I did.

I have always wanted to learn how to sew, so Josh's parents gave me two months worth of sewing lessons! His mom picked out this cute sewing box for me and filled it with all the sewing basics. (It's probably the cutest sewing box EVER) I am well on my way to becoming a domestic goddess!

Josh's parents gave us our own decks of one of our favorite games, Hand n Foot! I had never played this game until Josh and I started dating, and I absolutely love it!

My parents gave us this game. Self-explanatory. The weapons are hilarious! Bacon grill, rabid bat, World's Best Boss mug, Dundee award, etc.!

Josh and I had a lot of fun exchanging gifts with each other! He didn't know any of his gifts, so it was fun to surprise him. I got him an Indianapolis Colts vintage t-shirt, SNL Best of Will Ferrell-both of them, this awesome game he really wanted called Rate Your Mate(probably the funniest couples game ever!) and I cracked and got him Madden 10 for his Xbox.... I know, I know. Bad idea. He got me some clothes and some jewelry! I love my husband.

It's kind of weird to think that this is technically the 3rd Christmas that Josh has been in my life. Two years ago at this time, we were kinda hanging out/kinda dating and he invited me to his friends' Christmas party. I was SO excited because I liked him a lot, but knew he had also been kinda dating another girl(he never hears the end of it about that...haha) so I was hoping that him inviting me to the party was a sign that he really liked me. Almost. After that party, his friends were always telling him to date me, but it took him another year before he started listening to them. :) I'm so glad he did.

Last Christmas, we had just barely started hanging out again. I had gone through a horrible breakup in August, and I was pretty fragile all during the Fall. I was terrified of even liking someone again, so I was really nervous when Josh was calling me to hang out-especially with how things were with him before. But I put my guard up high and decided to give it ago. We went out a few days before Christmas and then again right as the new year started. From then on we were pretty much dating and the rest is history! I love that Christmastime reminds me of those fun and key moments of our relationship. I look forward to spending many more Christmases with my cute honey!

Christmas Festivities!

2009-12-30T21:23:00.012-07:00

I have been a slacker with my blog these past few weeks! But we have had a lot of fun enjoying the holidays and spending lots of time together! Right before Christmas, we were able to go to several fun parties and events.

First of all, we had my work Christmas party. It was a black tie event, so it was fun to get all dressed up. The party was at the Hidden Valley Country Club in Draper and everything turned out perfect. I am on the Party Planning Committee at work, so it was fun to see everything come together! It was a lot of work, but well worth it. We had a delicious dinner, followed by a Casino Night where we got to play Craps, Blackjack or Roulette. Our remaining chips at the end determined what our prize would be. There were some amazing gifts worth hundreds of dollars, but we just ended up with a giftcard to Nordstrom-which is fine by me! It's about time I got me some new jeans! :)

Here we are at the party. I LOVED my dress! I actually borrowed it from my friend's little sister. Thanks, Amy!

We also had our annual high school friends Christmas Party. Lisa and Abe were nice enough to host it, and they did a great job! We ate lots of yummy food and played some fun Christmas games. It was so fun to get together with everyone because we don't see each other enough. We also celebrated Konni's birthday, which happened to be the same day as the party.

I sure love these girls!

Some of us posing on the stairs

The next day, we had a Christmas party with Josh's friends. We had a white elephant gift exchange and played Loaded Questions: Adult Version, so that made for a hilarious evening! They also made it an ugly sweater party this year, and lucky for me, my mom is a first grade teacher, so I had quite the selection of sweaters to choose from. :) Plus she was able to supply me with that lovely turtleneck and necklace. I love you mom!

My family doesn't have a lot of Christmas traditions, but the ones that we do have, I LOVE! The Monday before Christmas we had our annual Spaghetti Factory dinner with the Walker family. The Walker's are in my parent's ward and we have been friends with them for years. We figured out that this year was our 14th year doing this tradition and we hope it continues for at least 14 more years! I have so much love for the Walker family and we go back a long time! It was so fun to have Josh be a part of this tradition now. He loves the Walker's as well!

Here we are at Trolley Square waiting for our names to be called. There was a Santa display with no Santa in it, so we decided to take over his sleigh! Ava wanted to be in the picture with us. She is the funniest 2 year old around!

Looking at all these pictures makes me realize that one of my favorite things about the Christmas season is that there seem to be more opportunities to spend time with the ones you love the most. I am grateful to have such amazing people in my life.

we have an addiction....

2009-12-17T14:46:00.012-07:00

to this show:

So far in our marriage, cable has not been in our budget. (please let it be someday soon!) We have rabbit ears so we can at least get the local channels, but there usually isn't a whole lot to watch on those 5 or 6 stations. Because of this, we have been watching tv on DVD. We may not have cable, but we've got a sweet 46" HD tv that we've got to put to good use! :)

We first started with all the seasons of The Office, and even used some of our Target gift cards from the wedding to purchase season 5. Plus Josh hadn't seen all of the episodes, so it was fun to introduce him to some of my favorites. The Office never gets old to me!

Anyway, after finishing all 5 seasons of The Office, Josh suggested that we start watching Prison Break. He had seen the first two seasons a while ago, and wanted to get into it again. Plus between his immediate and extended family, we have access to all the seasons. I didn't know much about the show, but had heard it was good. We started watching in early November with our friends James and Tiare, and to be honest, my initial expectations were not very high.

After only a few episodes, I. Was. Hooked.

I cannot get enough of the show. Plus we got Tiare and James hooked on it with us, which makes it even more fun to watch. It is full of suspense and keeps you on the edge of your seat episode after episode. I know we are a little behind in this venture, seeing as Prison Break has been around since 2005, but better late than never, right? We have finished the first two seasons and will hopefully be starting season 3 in the VERY near future. I think tv on DVD is one of the best ideas ever- especially when we don't have DVR. It's so fun to have something so good to watch on these cold winter nights when you just want to stay home all warm and cozy.

So, if you're looking for something amazingly good to watch, start watching Prison Break!! I promise you will love it! Plus it doesn't hurt that this beautiful man is the main character. (You might recognize him from 2 Mariah Carey music videos. haha!)

I love you, Michael Scofield.

Cinderelly, Cinderelly

2009-12-08T18:46:00.020-07:00

So I have a Cinderella costume that is pretty dang awesome! A few weeks ago, one of my best friends asked if I would come as Cinderella for her daughter's 3rd birthday party. I was more than excited to do this! I've always wanted to work in Disneyland as one of the princesses-specifically Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty, so this gave me an idea of what that would be like.

I cannot even begin to tell you how fun and adorable this experience was. I was greeted at the door by about 8 little girls, dressed as princesses. I don't think I have ever had anyone be so excited to see me! I was immediately showered with hugs and they all seemed so happy that "Cinderella" came to hang out with them.

They were SO cute! We took some pictures and then had lunch. All during the meal, they were asking me all these questions like,

"Did you come here in your carriage?"

"Do your mice still live with you?"

"Are you friends with Snow White or Belle?"

"What is Prince Charming doing today?"

"Do you ever see your fairy godmother?"

Those are only a few of the questions, but you get the idea. They had Disney Princess napkins for the little lunch and they kept pointing to Cinderella and saying, "Look! That's you!!" It was absolutely adorable. Some of the girls at the party were around 8 years old or so, and they were a little skeptical if I was the real Cinderella or not. One little girl asked me if I was the REAL Cinderella and so I asked her if I looked like the real Cinderella and she said, yes, so then I assured her that I was the REAL Cinderella.

I had an absolute blast playing Cinderella for an afternoon! I'm glad it was a hit with the birthday girl and her cousins. Unfortunately, I forgot to put the battery back in my camera after I had specifically charged it for this event, so I didn't get any pictures on my camera with the cute little girls. :( BUT-I did make Josh take a picture of me when I got home from the party. Too bad my headband thing is kinda screwy, but you get the idea. Josh got quite a kick out of me while I was Cinderella-fying myself.

If any of you need Cinderella to make an appearance at your next party, you know who to call! :)

I think I've got the black lung, pop!!

2009-12-03T13:44:00.006-07:00

Sunday morning before church, Josh and I were standing by the fridge and right after he finished telling me that he felt like he was coming down with something, he sneezed in my face! I freaked out, grabbed the sanitizer and asked him why he sneezed in my face. He said he didn't want to sneeze in the fridge....

Ever since Monday, I have not stopped coughing. And let me tell you, a bad cough has got to be one of the best ab workouts out there! Where is bikini season when I need it! :) Anyway, I am just grateful that I am the one that got hit hard with whatever sickness this is because Josh is taking the LSAT TOMORROW! Josh has been a little bit under the weather, but he has been well enough to focus and study a lot.

I am so proud of him. The LSAT is not easy by any means, but 3 times a week he has gone to an LSAT study course and studied several other hours besides that. Hopefully all of his studying will pay off! I know it will! I am so grateful for my hard working honey!

I also want to say how grateful I am for my parents and my in laws. Monday night when I was feeling like crap and Josh was in class, my parents gave us some cough medicine and a bottle of deluxe orange juice- which was delicious! Also, my cute mother-in-law brought us some cough drops, juice and a humidifier. I am so grateful for a wonderful family that is always there for us. It's interesting how many little things you take for granted by living at home- like always having cough drops and cough syrup in the cupborad or having access to a humidifier. We are blessed to have such wonderful families.

And lastly, I would like to give a shout out to Coca Cola Classic! Besides all the coughing, I have also had an upset stomach this whole week and Coke has been the only thing that has sounded good and tasted good to me. Thank you, Coke!

Christmas with Archie

2009-12-01T11:21:00.011-07:00

As most of you know, I am a HUGE David Archuleta fan. I absolutely adore that kid. Last week he performed 2 Christmas concerts in Salt Lake City and being the fanatic that I am, I went to both. :) My parents are also big David fans, so when I told them about the concert, they offered to take me and Josh to it. (I love my parents! Thanks, Mom and Dad!!!) So I went one night with Josh and my parents and one night with my friend Steph who is also a David fanatic. And let me tell you, David Archuleta does NOT disappoint! Yes he is a little shy and awkward when he is talking in between songs, but that is part of his charm. Here is a pic from the show.

Some of you may wonder why I love this kid so much, so here are some reasons: I love that after winning $100,000 on Star Search when he was 12, he gave $10,000 in tithing. I love that he's not afraid to basically bear his testimony in his "thank you's" on his Christmas album. I love that at his Christmas concert, he was not afraid to express his love and thanks to his Savior. I love that he is a good role model and I LOVE that he can sing like there's no tomorrow. I hope David can have a long and successful career. He certainly has the talent for it!

One of the highlights of the show was that his mom came out and sang with him. On his Christmas album, he sings "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" as a duet, so during that song, he welcomed his mom to the stage. After hearing her sing, I definitely know where David's talent comes from. She has a beautiful voice and it was so fun watching them sing with each other. You can tell he loves his mom a lot. He's adorable.

My favorite moment of the concert was when he sang "Prayer of the Children." I first fell in love with that song in high school after hearing a group of guys sing it at the Veteran's Day concert. David sang it so heartfelt and perfectly and lucky for you, you can hear it too! Enjoy!

Warning: You will get chills and/or cry!

Dear Edward,

2009-11-17T18:17:00.002-07:00

I can't wait for our date on Friday night! I have been waiting for this moment for a long time. I love you.

Love,

Allison

New Moon on Friday!!!

I can't freakin wait!! I just re-read the book since it has been two years since I first read it and I am SO ready for this movie! From the previews, it looks like it will be much better than the first! (I am hoping) They have a bigger budget and a new director, so I can't wait to see how this movie is portrayed! I wanted to go to the midnight premier, but realized I probably wouldn't be a very good employee at work on Friday with only 3 hours of sleep. I will do my best to patiently wait an extra 20 hours to see it. :) Team Edward all the way!!

thank you's...

2009-11-13T14:08:00.003-07:00

Well, I FINALLY mailed out the thank you notes from the wedding! What a relief! I'm a little embarrassed that it took me 3 months because I was very good at getting all the thank you notes from my showers done within a week or two after each shower.

We actually had all of them written the day we got back from our honeymoon because I had this brilliant idea that as we opened each wedding gift, we would quickly write the thank you note before moving on to the next gift.(I'm a genius, I know!) So, it was very efficient to get them done that way, but it took me WAY too long to get them all addressed. Hopefully everyone will get their thank you note, and if we missed anyone, I am VERY sorry!

Josh and I are so grateful for all the support we have received as we have started our lives together. Thank you everyone for being so generous and amazing to us! We are very blessed!

Thank You!!

life.

2009-11-10T16:42:00.088-07:00

Life is precious.

I have been thinking about that a lot lately.

Yesterday I attended the funeral for the father of one of my good friends. He passed away last week after a violent battle with H1N1/pneumonia. Ever since I found out that he was so sick, my thoughts and prayers have not left my cute friend and her cute family. My heart has been hurting for their family.

The funeral was a wonderful tribute to her amazing father and painted a beautiful picture of the kind of man he was, and still is. We are so lucky to have the Gospel in our lives and I know this family has been able to feel some comfort during this difficult time because of their knowledge of eternal families. They know he is waiting for them to join him someday and that he is taking care of his grandchildren that have not yet come to this earth. They will see him again.

In the wake of this tragedy, it has made me reflect on the things that I need to work on in my life. We never know when our time on earth will come to an end, so we need to be our best self and treasure every moment. One of my favorite primary songs has been coming to my mind a lot lately:

"My life is a gift. My life has a plan. My life has a purpose; in heaven it began. My choice was to come to this lovely home on earth and seek for God's light to direct me from birth.

I will follow God's plan for me. Holding fast to his word and his love. I will work, and I will pray, I will always walk in his way. Then I will happy on earth and in my home above."

We don't always like Heavenly Father's plan for us, or for those we love, but he knows what's best for us and He will guide us and direct us if we let Him. I love the words to this song. I do want to follow God's plan for me. I hope I can always walk in his way. I know that truly is the only way to be happy.

I will pray a little more. Have a little more faith. Read my scriptures more. Give a little more service. Smile more often. Be a little nicer. Have a better attitude. Tell my family and friends I love them more often. Have a little more patience. Have a little more compassion. I will live life to its fullest. I will not take things for granted. I will count my blessings.

I know if I do these things, then I really will be happy on this earth and in my home above.

A wedding, a birthday and an anniversary

2009-11-09T17:45:00.009-07:00

November 6th was a special day!

First of all, my cute friend Katy got married to Brad Miles. They are one of those couples that just seems absolutely perfect for each other. I am so so SO happy for them and I am so grateful to call Katy my friend. Katy is such an awesome girl and is always fun to be around. And she is always there for you. She cried with me when I got dumped a year and a half ago and I cried with her when she and Brad broke up and went through a little rough patch. I hope Katy and Brad have an eternity of happiness together!!

Me, the beautiful bride, Heather and Chochie

Me and Heather. I love this girl and don't see her enough.

Chochie and me. Love her. It's her birthday tomorrow!

Second of all, November 6th was my little Elle's 5th birthday! (You better believe I am blogging about my dog's birthday!) You see Elle is a special little dog. Not only is she the cutest ball of fur that's ever lived, but she has lived a much longer life than we would have ever expected. When Elle was about 3 months old, she was no longer able to keep any food down. You could see it in her little face that she did not feel well most of the time. After several trips to various vets, she was diagnosed with acid reflux combined with a rare esophageal problem. Her esophagus is slightly bent, making it difficult for food to go down. The vets thought that as she began growing to her full size that her esophagus would continue to bend and eventually close off and that she would not survive. Our family was devastated. Since Elle is the product of my grandparent's dog, Maggie, we had become attached to her the day she was born. The vet did give the option of surgery to correct her esophagus, but as you can imagine, that was not going to be cheap. But we were all so in love with our new puppy that my parents decided it was worth a shot. Elle went in for surgery, and the vets discovered that her little esophagus was not as bent as they thought and that surgery was not necessary! She is our little miracle dog. And although she still has a difficult time with eating once in a while, we are grateful she belongs to our family because we don't know if other families would be as patient with her health issues. We sure love our pomeranian!

This is a little video of Elle playing with her baby brother from a different litter of puppies(same mom and dad though) Her little brother looks EXACTLY like Elle did when we got her. Adorable!

Oh and a quick funny story. The morning we were told Elle wasn't going to survive her medical issues, I was very upset and cried A LOT! That night I was supposed to go on a date, but knew that I wouldn't be much fun and would probably end up crying on the date, so I called up my date to cancel and explain my situation. When I called, he did not answer, so I decided to leave a message on his voicemail. I couldn't make it through the voicemail without crying as I explained the situation with my new puppy. He called back and acted sympathetic. Acted being the key word....because a few years later, I found out that he thought my message was a hoax and just a lame way to get out of a date and he had played my voicemail for ALL of his friends!! Funny, huh? Just one more example of why you should give people the benefit of the doubt!

And lastly, November 6th was the 3 month anniversary of the best day of my life!!

I can't believe we have been married for 3 months already!! Time flies by so quickly! It is almost difficult to remember life before Josh and I am so grateful that he is ALL MINE for eternity! He brings so much joy into my life and I love him more than anything. He always makes me laugh and I always look forward to spending time with him. He supports me in everything I do and I know that he is always there for me. I love you, Joshua!!

Halloween 2009

2009-11-01T22:39:00.012-07:00

Get ready for picture OVERLOAD! We had quite the Halloween this year! We were able to go to 3 different parties and had a blast at all of them. Here is our Halloween in pictures...

My high school friends had a Halloween party on the 23rd. I love these girls and it was so fun to get together because we don't get to do that as often as we like. Thank you Abe and Lisa for hosting us at your beautiful new home!

Katherine and Konni had VERY creative costumes! Where's Waldo and his girlfriend.

Josh and I came up with our costumes about one hour before the party started.

(In case you can't tell, Josh is Zorro and I am a witch-I say I am Elphaba:)

On the 30th, we went to a party that my cute friend Heather threw! She went all out and hosted such a great party. I freaking love her!

Here is me as Dorothy and Josh as Zorro again... My Dorothy costume is from 5th grade. If I weighed one more pound, it would definitely not fit me!

At Heather's party, we got to spend lots of time with these two...Dani and Nic. They are so much fun and we had a blast with them. I wish I had taken more pictures of everyone. I need to be better at that!

On Halloween afternoon, my mom dropped by with this little black kitty. Isn't Ava adorable? And boy does she look like her daddy! By the way, her costume was MY costume when I was her age. My grandma made it for me and it is still in excellent condition. I hope someday to have a daughter that can also wear it!

My mom also brought this little pumpkin by. I must say, we have the cutest little dog in the world. But don't look at me too closely. This is was before I had showered and after I had been cleaning ALL day!

On Halloween night, Josh's friends threw a party. Josh was going to be Zorro again, but as we walked out the door to leave to the party, he had a brilliant idea and decided he should be the Wicked Witch of the West. And yes, that is the costume I wore the weekend before. haha. If you look closely, Josh even has some boobs!

Josh's face in this picture KILLS ME! Oh how I love him!

Here are the boys doing the donut game. They are so funny. And Josh in a dress is the funniest thing ever!

Thank you, James and Katie for throwing such a fun party! Again, I should have taken more pictures. Everyone's costumes were SUPERB!! Hopefully next year Josh and I will plan our costumes a little sooner!

The King of Pop

2009-11-01T22:17:00.032-07:00

On Thursday night I went to this movie....

With one of my favorite girls, Karen! aka Choch

Josh had is LSAT class, so Choch and I went on a little date to dinner and the Michael Jackson movie. If you have the opportunity to see it, DO IT!!! I am just in complete awe of his talent. Even at the age of 50, he could still do his signature moves just as well as he did them when he was in his 20's.

Yes I know Michael Jackson was very odd and a part of me does think he was a big weirdo creep, but since his death, and especially after seeing this movie, his talent and dedication to his work outshines his weirdness. And how can you not love all of his songs?? Which by the way, he wrote most of them. I swear when it comes to music, there is nothing he could not do. One thing I really loved about the movie is that it showed different sides of MJ that we haven't really seen before. You see him joking around and being goofy with his band and crew and you could really see the love he had for the world, environment and people in general. I think MJ really did have good intentions in almost everything he did.

I honestly think that part of Michael Jackson's weirdness stems from many things. Obvious reasons being his abusive father, becoming a superstar at such a young age and never having a normal childhood. But I think that the biggest contributor of his oddness is the fact that he was so unbelievably talented at singing, dancing, songwriting, performing, etc. He truly is in a league of his own, and because of that, he really had no one that he could really relate to or anyone that could understand what it was like to have that kind of success. Can you imagine what that must of been like to not be able to really relate to anyone? VERY sad if you ask me.

My brother Mark has always been a HUGE MJ fan, so from an early age, I was exposed to a whole lot of MJ! Sometimes my mom would make us change the channel when his crotch grabbing became excessive, but I have always had a great love for his music and a great admiration and respect for his talent. I will forever and always be an MJ fan and will make sure my kids know and love his music! I love you, MJ!!

Two is better than one

2009-10-26T19:45:00.007-06:00

It's crazy how since we've been married, we feel like we see each other WAY less than we did when we were dating or engaged. Have any of you experienced that?

Since I started working 40 hours a week, and since he decided to take the LSAT, our time together has decreased significantly! I don't think I have made the big blog announcement but yes, Joshua is taking the LSAT on December 5th! It is something he has always been interested in doing and with the economy being the way it is, he decided that in order to be more successful in the future, law school was the right fit for him. When he decided to go ahead with the LSAT, I asked if he wanted to watch "Legally Blonde" to give him some inspiration, but he shot that down!

I fully support him in this new endeavor. And if any of you know Josh well, you know that he is VERY good at arguing and winning! :) He has done really well on his practice tests and has continued to improve each week. I am one proud wife!

This is one of my favorite pictures from our bridals. His face is so adorable.

I feel like I love Josh more and more everyday. Marriage is a big adjustment, but I am grateful to be going through this big adjustment with Josh. He is so patient with me and he works so hard in all that he does so that we can have a successful future. Our busy lives make our time together that much more precious. Sometimes I find myself missing him like crazy while I'm at work. Especially on days when I know I will only see him briefly in passing as I get home at 5:30 and he leaves for his LSAT study course from 6 until 9. I don't know if he knows how excited I get to see him.

We always have so much fun together-whether it's popping popcorn and watching some episodes of "The Office" together, or going on dates, or teasing each other about the weird people we used to date :) or snuggling in bed, it's always a good time. We are also learning how to adjust to living with each other. Josh is ALL man and I am ALL girl, so you can imagine that life can get a little interesting for us. I am learning that Sunday afternoons are spent watching MANY football games(I've actually been learning a lot about the NFL) and he is learning that I HAVE to get my sleep or else I can't function very well and most of all, he has had to learn that I cry a LOT. Most of the time, it's for no reason but I have always been that way and wish I didn't have such powerful waterworks!

I am so grateful to have Joshua for eternity. I love him more than anything and can't imagine life without him. A few weeks ago, my alarm went off and when I woke up, I realized we had been holding hands in our sleep. Life is good.

This is a picture from our wedding day that my brother took. I don't know why, but I LOVE this picture. I think it just captures our personalities very well.

I love my hot honey.

Defying Gravity

2009-10-24T11:19:00.002-06:00

If you haven't ever heard that song, you should probably listen to it! Amazing! And the belting at the end of the song is incredible!

In case you didn't know, that is the name of a song from Wicked!! Yes, I am back and Wicked was everything I hoped it would be and more! My mom and I had such a great time in Colorado. It was a super short trip-only 48 hours long, but well worth it. We got to do a little shopping, and believe me, the shopping there is WAY better than the shopping here! We also got to spend some quality time with my uncle(my mom's brother) Richard and my aunt Tammy. They are a ball of fun and they treat you like royalty when you stay with them!

Tuesday night was the big night! We had a DELICIOUS steak dinner in downtown Denver and then we were off to enjoy some Wicked! My mom said I was like a little kid on Christmas. But I think she was almost as excited as I was. We had no idea where our seats were since my aunt had ordered them for us, and she tried to trick us and tell us they weren't as good as she hoped they would be. So as we're walking in the theatre, we kept walking down closer and closer to the stage and it turns out that we were on the 4th row in the middle section and my aunt turned to us and said, "Okay I lied."!! I almost started crying! Being up that close puts a whole new spin on going to the theatre. You can see their facial expressions and so many more details and you almost feel like you're part of the show. But Wicked is amazing from any seat!

Anyway, my mom LOVED the show! I think as much as I did! Especially because she ended up watching a lot of Wizard of Oz with me when I was young. I am so happy she liked it! It was fun to spend time with her, even though I missed being away from Joshua. Unfortunately I did not take a single picture on the short trip! We wanted to take one outside the theatre, but it was about 35-40 degrees and raining/snowing so we hurried inside and forgot to take one inside. I'm bummed but I guess that means we'll just have to see Wicked again! :)

In 48 hours....

2009-10-18T19:29:00.009-06:00

I will be enjoying this....

And this.....

That's right folks. On Tuesday, I am seeing Wicked with my mama in Denver! I am so excited for her to see it. She was nice enough to give Josh her ticket back in April when it came here. Words cannot even begin to describe my excitement. I think I could quite possibly be one of the biggest Wicked fanatics out there. And let me explain why:

When I was a little girl, I was never really into a lot of cartoons or shows directed towards young children(with the exception of Mr. Roger's and Today's Special of course.) At an early age, my mom exposed me to such classics as "Pollyanna," "The Parent Trap,"(Hayley Mills version) and my all time favorite, "The Wizard of Oz." I was absolutely obsessed with all things Wizard of Oz. I was completely fascinated by the movie. I couldn't get enough of it. I still can't. Anytime I see anything Wizard of Oz, I must stop and look at it. This year marks the 70th anniversary of the release of the movie, so lucky for me, Wizard of Oz merchandise is everywhere. That is pretty much heaven for me. When I have told friends that The Wizard of Oz was my favorite movie, a lot of them said they were afraid of that movie when they were little because of the witch and the flying monkeys. I never classified that movie as being scary at all, but I can definitely understand why it could be scary for children. Anyway, just to give you an idea of my obsession...

This is on my 4th birthday. I would not put my Dorothy doll down. I still have her.

Here I am with some more of my Wizard of Oz goods. My dress my aunt made me, my Toto dog and basket, and of course, my Dorothy doll.

And here I am again. Judging by my awesome bangs, this was probably sometime during or after kindergarten. I think my aunt made me 2 Dorothy dresses and I wore them as often as my mom would let me. And if you look closely, you can notice my red shoes. If I couldn't wear my Dorothy dress, I had to at least be able to wear my red shoes.

They were one of they things I was most obsessed with . Still am. There is a lady on eBay who custom makes some amazing replicas in your size and I fully intend on purchasing some someday! :)

Anyway, I am super stoked to be able to see Wicked again. I can't get enough of it! When I first heard about Wicked 5 or 6 years ago, I didn't have any high expectations of it because how on earth could anyone even attempt to create a "prequel" to such a classic. Lucky for me, they couldn't have done a better job tying Wicked into The Wizard of Oz without ruining anything! And the music in both is just amazing. Seriously, there is nothing I love more than great music! If you ever get the opportunity to see Wicked, DO IT!! You will NOT regret it! Also, I highly recommend that all of you whip out the old classic and watch The Wizard of Oz in the near future! After all, one of the best songs of all time is in it! :)

p.s. There is a rumor that in The Wizard of Oz you can see a man hang himself in the background. Let me assure you that this rumor is FALSE! I have seen that movie literally hundreds of times, and it does not happen! I have watched that supposed scene several times and did not see any man hang himself.

funny story

2009-10-15T09:41:00.002-06:00

About a week or so ago, Josh and I babysat Ava at our apartment for a few hours. When Ava first got there, Josh was watching a DVD for his LSAT course, so my original plan of watching a Disney Princess movie with her had to be put on hold. Since there's not much to entertain a 2 year-old with in our little apartment, I resorted to showing her pictures from the wedding on our computer. Ava LOVES to look at pictures, so this was working out well.

After going through the wedding pictures, I started showing her pictures of our honeymoon. As you know, we went on our honeymoon to Hawaii, so the majority of our pictures were taken on the beach in our swimsuits. When I got to pictures of Josh at the beach, she started saying, "Josh naked, Josh naked!" I started laughing, but didn't think much of it because whenever Ava sees a man mowing his lawn or running without a shirt on, she always says, "Man naked, he's naked."

When we were through looking through the pictures, Josh was still occupying the TV, so I decided to paint her fingernails. As I am painting her nails, she says, "I wanna see naked Josh, I wanna see naked Josh!" I could not stop laughing! Which was probably a bad thing because then that just egged her on to keep saying it! I guess her little crush on Josh has escalated to a whole new level! :)

I just hope when she sees Josh at church on Sundays she won't yell out, "I wanna see naked Josh!"

Kids really do say the darndest things!

Interesting....

2009-10-10T10:13:00.003-06:00

If any of you have looked through this month's Ensign, you probably saw the articles about blogging. Josh actually pointed the articles out to me. I found it very interesting that the church encourages positive blogging. It can be a great missionary tool and I had never really thought of it that way. Very cool!

Anyway, I really liked the article and thought I would share my favorite parts with you. There was a section called, "Better Blogging: Tips for Safety and Courtesy." I thought it had some good advice and some good reminders for bloggers. Here it is:

Better Blogging: Tips for Safety and Courtesy
Do you want to start a blog? You can keep in touch with friends and family or share the gospel by blogging. (Remember that you are speaking only for yourself and not the Church.)
“Better Blogging: Tips for Safety and Courtesy,” Ensign, Oct. 2009, 27

Blog Safety
Avoid Specifics
Chelsea Belton, who blogs to keep in touch with family and friends, never posts personal information online. She avoids mentioning addresses, birth dates, anniversaries, and other details that would make it easy to locate her family. Some bloggers also use partial or fictional names or general phrases like “my son” or “our friend” when referring to individuals in blog posts.

Moderate Comments
David Habben, who maintains both personal and business blogs, says that reviewing comments is an important part of safe blogging. While an author’s original post may be harmless, comments from readers may be less innocent. Some entities also use blog commenting to advertise or disseminate unwanted information. David uses a security feature that informs him by e-mail when someone wants to make a comment. He can then review each comment and delete those that are inappropriate or unwanted before they appear online.

Selectively Post Pictures
“Once I posted [a photo of] a birthday party invitation I had made [for my son],” says Rachel Davis, creator of a group blog for LDS women. “I used photo editing software to blur out the location of the party because I just didn’t want [to take a] chance. It was a small thing to do, but it made me feel safe.” Be aware of information you may be giving inadvertently in the photos you display on your blog. Wisely screening photos will allow you to share ideas while protecting yourself and your family.

Blog Courtesy
Think before You Post
Search engines are the “conscience” of the Internet. They can call up almost any Web site from any period of time. So assume that what you post on your blog is permanent. The pictures of your children doing silly things as little kids may be funny or cute right now, but imagine those same pictures appearing when your children are 12 or 45. Carefully consider the pictures you post and the things you write.

Be Positive
“I have been surprised when … ward members or even old friends from high school read my blog,” says Kacy Faulconer, who writes personal and group blogs. Blogs should not be a “forum to complain or criticize people behind their backs,” she says. Instead, keep your comments positive. You never know who may be reading.

Respect Others’ Work
Sue Anderson, who began a blog because she loved reading her daughter-in-law’s, says it’s important to respect other bloggers’ work. Instead of copying and pasting something from a blog you like, “send friends a link to the blog itself.” She also recommends that “if you want to use something on your blog from someone else’s, [including photos], ask them first.” This protects others’ work and keeps you honest.

I thought that this was all great advice. Especially since it came from a church magazine. It gave me some things to think about-especially when Josh and I decide to start a family. I will probably decide to make my blog private someday.

The part that really stuck out to me was the "Be Positive" section. I love that it emphasized that blogs shouldn't be a "forum to complain or criticize people behind their backs." This hit home to me because I have been a victim of that. I had someone make a blog post criticizing me and some of my interests. My name was not mentioned specifically, but it was obvious that the post was about me. Thankfully, that particular blog is now private, but I am still aware of unfavorable things being said that are directed toward me. It is very hurtful and offensive that this has happened, but I'm not going to let it bring me down. I'm bigger and better than that.

Because of that incident, it has made me want to make my blog a positive one. I hope I never hurt or offend anyone because of what I post on my blog. I do understand that a blog is a place to share your feelings, ask for advice and even vent-BUT, if the venting turns into hurting someone's feelings directly, even if you do not care for that person, I think that is extremely inappropriate. Anyway, that is just my opinion! Here's to better blogging!!! :)

To read the full article, click here
http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=931e52605a4e3210VgnVCM100000176f620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD

Babies.

2009-10-07T18:18:00.014-06:00

No, I am NOT pregnant!

But...a lot of people around me have been or are currently pregnant!!

This one's for you, Nat!!

My good friend Tiare had her darling baby boy, Caleb, on September 14th! He is so cute and I think he's gonna look like his mama! I sure love little Caleb! And lucky for us, Tiare, James and baby Caleb live below us in our apartment complex. We love spending time with them and love our new Thursday night "Office" parties! Here are some pictures of baby Caleb.

(p.s. Who thinks Tiare needs a blog?? I sure do! )

He has long fingers!

Me and the babe!

Yawn.

I think he's smiling at his mama in this one!

So cute!

Another cute baby is the new elephant at the zoo!! A few weeks ago, I was able to go to the zoo with Tyson and Ava and see the baby make its grand debut! She is the cutest little thing and I think it is so neat we are able to see such amazing animals up close. There are also baby tigers, a baby giraffe, baby snow leopard and a baby crocodile at the zoo right now. I love baby animals! Well, maybe not baby crocodiles. :) Here is the cute baby elephant. Her name is Zuri.

Scratching up against her mama

So tiny next to mom.

Loves.

I have come to the conclusion that Josh is secretly baby hungry. He won't admit it, but I think he is more than he knows it! :) He likes to joke that we won't have kids for 10 years.(don't worry, I WON'T let this happen!) I know when the time is right, he will be the cutest dad. He loves our friends' babies!

Here he is with cute little Jaxon.

See. Baby hungry.

This is the baby I miss everyday! My cute little Ellie belly. My Elle Woods. Oh how I love her. Look at that face. Adorable. Not seeing her everyday has been the hardest thing for me about moving out of my parent's house. She's a princess.

And last but not least, my other favorite baby girl! Miss Ava Anne. I have not yet made the blog announcement that she is going to be a big sister! That's right, Baby Girl Bringhurst(#2) will join our family the beginning of February! I can't wait! I've never seen Josh around a baby girl, so that will make it even more fun! :) Don't worry Ava, we'll give you some cousins to play with in a few years!