Christmastime

We will definitely be posting more pictures this year, but here are some Christmasy pictures we have from last year. Christmas is almost here and I am almost missing it. I have been sick the past week and it has been miserable. I sleep during the day but am awake through the night. Now I am feeling better and am ready to get back into the Christmas season! We are spending Christmas with both our families this year. It's much easier to do that when they only live 30 minutes apart. The 23rd is when my family meets together for our big combined Christmas Eve activities. We do the Nativity and eat appetizerish food and my dad sings the Christmas Song. Then we go carolling which is optional, but against Juan's will I always choose to go. We just go to 6 families that we grew up with and they expect us so it's not cheesy or annoying or anything. On the 24th, we will be at Juan's mom's here in Provo. She is making us a fabulous Christmas feast. I'm very comfortable with Juan's family, so I am excited to spend my Christmas Eve with them. We'll be back at my parents' for Christmas morning! Back and forth and I'm sure plenty of time for ourselves and our friends! Two of our good friends are staying in town for Christmas because they each just had a baby. We are lucky to be surrounded by so many great people for the holidays!

The Boston Couple

Ginger and Sam are back in town! They have spent a lot of time in Utah this year. Sam is doing another internship with a dentist for dental school until March, so they will be living with my parents for the next 3 months! We love having Sam and Ginger in town. Whenever they go back to Boston (Sam is in the middle of his 2nd year of Dental school at Boston University), Juan is always like, I miss Sam. We went down the South Jordan last night to hang out with them. We just sat around and talked and my good mom made us all dinner, Crystal, Darren, and Judson were also there. Of course Sam didn't believe anything I said, so throughout the night he pulled out his laptop and started looking things up on me. I thought Million Dollar Baby was based on a true story and I thought Ali the movie grossed more that $100 million. Turns out I accidentally lie more than I thought! Ha ha, it was a fun night.

The Mir

I realized I have pictures with all my other friends, but Miriam. We need to take more pictures together! So I just stole this one off of her blog. This is my bff Miriam. We have been friends for 10 years now! Seems crazy I know. She knew me through all my awkward "tween" years. Yes I am being trendy and using the word tween. She taught me how to dress normal and how to actually talk to people. I was definitely an awkward 13 year old, let's be sure of that. But I had fun, so that's all that matters. Miriam is currently living in Utah and we see each other all the time. She was my roommate until I got married and we've stayed close since. Yeah shockingly I didn't drop all my single friends when I got married like they say boring married folks do. She's a dating queen and I don't care who she marries as long as he has plans to keep her here in Utah by me. Oh and I guess he should make her happy too.

BYU Game Blues

Juan and I went up to the BYU basketball game in Salt Lake this weekend. We drove up with my mom and dad and enjoyed a very lively game! Wow people were a lot more crazy in the Delta Center than they are at the Marriott Center here in Provo. BYU was up the whole game, and managed to lose in the last 10 minutes. Sad. I don't really care about sports though, so it's not that sad for me. I really just go to the games for the atmosphere and the food. Juan loves sports though, so I'm glad I can support him in his hobbies since he constantly watches all my drama-filled tv shows with me (some shows he secretly loves, but would never admit out loud so he can keep up his macho persona). We went to my parents' house after and hung out with Heather and Tyler and Crystal and Darren. Ginger and Sam get into town today from Boston and will be here until March! So I'm sure we'll be spending a lot of time with my family this holiday season.

Christmas Decorations!

I convinced Juan to let us decorate the house with our Christmas tree and 4 other decorations a little early this year. I just wanted to get it all done before my vacation because it's hard work! I don't like to do hard work on my days off. Juan kept saying how we needed to honor the pilgrims and I told him in the 7 1/2 years I've known him, I've never heard about him honoring the pilgrims. Ha ha.

To honor the pilgrims, for Juan.

Our Christmas tree in the dark, we need the start to light up somehow.

Here it is all bright with the cute bear friend.

We got all these decorations from my mom, she takes care of us.

Mr. Snowman.

Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving

We had a nice Thanksgiving weekend. We went to my parent's house in South Jordan and Miriam and Manda, and Craig and Lorel came as guests. There were so many people around, there was no room for awkwardness. The original plans were to eat at my house at 2 pm, then jot over to Juan's mom's for a second Thanksgiving dinner at 6 pm. Well we got there at 6 pm and they had eaten without us! Their turkey was done by 3 and they just couldn't wait. I was definitely okay with it considering I had eaten the world at my mom's. The rest of the weekend was filled with festivities. Lorel and I went shopping at 4:30 am on the Friday after Thanksgiving which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Then we watched the Christmas movie Elf with our friends on Saturday night. It was so nice to have the break from work and get a kick start into the Christmas season.

Lorel's Baby Shower

Picture: Rachelle, Lisse, Lorel, me, Olivia

Lorel is my bff who lives in my apartment complex. It was her baby shower a few saturdays ago and she posted this picture on her blog and I thought it was a good one of all of us. Rachelle, Lisse, and Lorel are all pregnant. Rachelle and Lorel are both due on December 21 and Lisse is due in March. Olivia and I are part of the non-pregnant club since we're surrounded by pregnant women. You would think pregnant women would be the minority. We all have a lot of fun together and hang out a lot. Lorel and I just went shopping on Black Friday at 4:30 am. We each found some stuff, but now we're both taking it all back! Ha ha, guess we weren't in our right minds that early in the morning. I'm grateful for my friends!

Happy 2 Year Anniversary to Us!

We went to a Bed & Breakfast in Midway, UT called Johnson Mill for our 2nd anniversary. We went to the same place last year and we love it there! Here are some pictures from the trip. This picture basically represents the town of Midway... llamas. A close up of me and Juan. Don't love close ups of myself, but we only had ourselves to take the pictures!

This was at the restaurant Mountain House. They had already taken my plate, so Juan put his plate of veggies in front of me. I'm not anorexic, promise.

I don't know if you can tell, but our fireplace was see through! You could see into the bathroom from the living room. That is Juan's face back in the bathroom.

Just me on the couch. It was one of the reasons I chose the room, the leather couch. I like new things. New carpet, new decorations, everything was new.

View of Juan chillin on the bed.

Juan thinks he's the best.

The bathroom.

The bathtub, my heaven. I wish there was a jetted tub in my mini apartment. I think this tub is bigger than my whole bathroom at home!

Another view of the bathroom.

Doesn't it look like this deer was best friends with us? This is on the property of the B&B. Juan thought he was all tough getting close to the deer, then it would flinch and Juan would go running!

Juan looks like he has more hair than I do in this shot.

Our friend the deer again. The scenery was so nice.

Another close-up.

The deer!

It was such a nice trip, I didn't want to be at home. We had so much fun, went to Park City all day on Friday and went shopping. We watched movies and played the gamecube all weekend! Ha ha, not much different from what we do at home, but it was sooooo nice to get out of Provo.

Lagoon!

I like to go to Lagoon every now and then, and we didn't make it on the rides this summer, so I convinced Juan to take me since they closed for the season on October 30. It was so nice going when the weather was 60-65 degrees. I usually get so tired just from being so hot the whole time! We didn't even go to any of the haunted houses they had available, we just went on all the rides and had a really great time with just us two. Juan's so sweet for leaving his shop on certain days for little things that I like. And I am blessed to have a wonderful job that doesn't mind when I take days off.

Picture 1: On the swings
Picture 2: On the sky ride, ps Juan does that weird face on purpose. I guess he thinks he's too cool to smile sometimes.

Juan's Stitches

Ha ha, only a few days after Juan got his braces off, he got stitches! He was playing football with some guys from church and they were both running to catch the ball and collided. Juan bit all the way through his top lip. He got 5 stitches on the outside of his lip and 3 stitches on the inside. As of now, 12 days later, his stitches are out and the outside of his lip is completely healed! There is hardly a mark. I guess he heals well, which is good considering it was on his face!

Juan's Braces are off!!!

Is he the most gorgeous man ever? That is my husband. Yes his braces are off and he is loving it. We need to go out and eat corn on the cob right away (he ate everything else, even if he wasn't supposed to)! He didn't tell me he was getting them off this early. I was thinking it wasn't until January!!! And then he came home yesterday and had gotten me some roses. I was just so caught up with thanking him for that. I mean we were face to face talking, we even kissed a few times and nope, I didn't notice. And then he was like, I have another surprise, I got my braces off! Ah! I'm so mad I didn't even notice and I wish he would have waited to see when I would notice. Pretty funny. He's so handsome with his perfectly straight teeth. I'm a lucky girl.

Our Meineke

We've been open now for almost 3 months and the past 2 weeks, things have finally been going really well. We never went through a horrible period, but we did worry for a few weeks there. Juan is awesome at his job as the owner/manager and already has a manager-in-training for when Juan returns to school in January. Yes we have been busy, but I almost want to say I see Juan more than when he is in school because he gets home by 6:30 pm every night and has no homework or anything else to worry about but me. I am grateful for his hard work and dedication. People called me crazy for "letting" Juan do this business thing, but it's his dream and I'm glad I did.

The Weekend

I sit at my desk every day and as students pass by and ask me how my weekend was, I say, "it was good." Such a boring answer, but to be honest I say it because I'm too lazy to talk and carry on a conversation. Sometimes I just like to sit here and not talk for a full 4 hours. It's my little world that I like. Well we had an eventful weekend so I actually gave some answers this time. On Friday night, the Hayes, the Marshalls, the Goldmans and us all went to Vivian Park up in the mountains and made tin foil dinners. It was perfect weather and Juan and I came late and came up the wrong path, so I had to cross a rushing river by scooting over a log that I was sure was going to snap, but I made it alive! Of course Juan, being the man he is, ran over the log, but I wasn't so daring. We all had a great time and my first chicken tin foil dinner turned out tender and scrumptious. Juan ate most of my chicken, I'm definitely not a meat person these days. We didn't tell scary stories or sing like Lorel tried to suggest (we're all much too cool for that), we just talked for a few hours. I love having friends that we're so comfortable with. PS If you can't tell, my two friends Rachelle and Lorel on the far right of the girls picture are both 6 months pregnant.

Saturday came and I went shopping with Miriam in the morning. We went to Old Navy and got tons of clothes for 97 cents and I got a few sweaters that I splurged on and bought for $3.97 each! Ha ha, it's funny because any other day I would have seen a sweater on sale for $14.95 and thought is was a steal, but not this day, if it was $6.00 or more, I snarled while thinking, they're trying to rip us off! It was so much fun, I ended up walking away with 14 items (2 of which I'll never wear, but hey, they were a dollar!) and all together it costed me $35. Pretty good deal. Saturday night we went to Chili's with Craig and Lorel and it was soooo yummy. I like pregnant Lorel, she eats just as much as I do now. That's probably not a good thing that I'm eating for two when there's only one of me...

Sunday was Judson's blessing day. He is just a perfect baby. Juan said during the blessing, he just chilled up there and looked around as if he knew he was the king of the world at that moment. We all went back to my parents' house and ate and hung out back on the new deck. I want a house like theirs when I'm older, so that I can host all these people and actually fit them comfortably. The fam stayed and played Cathphrase afterwards and my team beat Juan's which is always a joy! Juan played with the kids the whole afternoon. Toni, my childhood friend, said that Juan looks like he's in his element when he's playing with kids. They all love him so much, I'm grateful for a husband like that. He'll be a wonderful father.

That was the weekend, we got home on Sunday night at 9 pm and took some time to ourselves. We played Mario Party, my recent love. I only love Mario nintendo games because the characters are cute. PS Juan is not shaving for 3 weeks and his poor facial hair is coming in patches. All my neices and nephews made fun of him this weekend!

Harry Potter, Twilight, The Wednesday Letters

I have been stuck on Harry Potter 2 for months now. I read the first Harry Potter book back in 2002 (ha ha) and then got stuck on the 2nd. And now here I am, reread the first book, stuck on the 2nd book again. Is there something wrong with me? Why does everyone looooooove Harry Potter and I can't even get through the first few books. I'm a big reader. I like to read, but haven't really been reading lately. My friend Lorel is obsessed with the new Twilight series that I really want to get into except the books are always checked out at the library. Mir just told me about this book called The Wednesday Laters that is a Notebookesque kind of book. The Notebook is the best movie ever and if it's sweet and romantic like that, then I better read it! We will see which one I end up reading.

Friends

This picture is a couple years old, but I love it. We love our friends. We live in an awesome apartment complex where mostly everyone around us are all married couples our age. This picture is Ryan and Lisse, Craig and Lorel, and Juan and me. We all hang out a few times a week. This past weekend, Lorel and I made dinner for 8 girlfriends of ours while the guys all went to Priesthood. When the guys got back, we all played games for the rest of the night. Eight couples is a lot, but it was so much fun and I am grateful that Juan and I can find so many people that we get a long with and laugh with.

Mac and Me

Ahhhhhhh! Here I am with a blog. I'm bored, so I thought, why not. So I am married to a gorgeous man named Juan and we have been married for 2 years. We live in a tiny apartment in Provo, Utah. I've lived in Provo for over 4 years now and absolutely love it. Yeah we live in a blissful life. I am madly in love with my husband. We have a lot of great friends, both our families living nearby (and I don't completely hate my mother-in-law); life is good. Blooming bliss... because it's only going to get better. We're going to fall deeper in love as we have kids together, I'm going to adore my children, new friends will come and the old will be kept. As good as the future will be, I love to live in the now and appreciate everything as it comes.