ghetto no more!

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

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!

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!!

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!!!

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.  :)