W.O.W. (Week of Wonderfulness)

As Tyler can attest, my happiness is most accurately measured by the amount of things I can check off my list. So I'd say this Spring Break was the best of those yet to come. We got our taxes done (we think), finally ordered our wedding pictures (only 7 months later), changed the brakes and replaced the door handle on the car, I went to a job interview in SLC and applied for another job, Tyler also applied for a job, we caught up on all the homework we needed to do (which is unheard and probably hasn't happened yet for Tyler this semester)...and also did about 5 other things on the list. Ahhhhhhhh...
We also got to measure our happiness by Tyler's standard, which is quality time. We had plenty of that this week with me not working and Tyler having Monday, and Tuesday off. We attended Aida at Viewmont, which was amazing. Those little Vikings look smaller every time I revisit VHS, but they are still just as talented. My very very talented friend Lindsay took the pictures for it!We also got to go to the Draper Temple open house. In efforts to fully prepare for that day I took an allergy pill so that the sunny day would not bother me. Turns out the pill was NOT non-drowsy and I took about 10 naps that day, literally! But between those naps we did enjoy seeing the new temple. It's absolutely gorgeous! My favorite room was probably the sealing room with the huge mirros and large windows that let in so much light. With Tyler's upholstery background, he pointed out all the little details in the chairs and couches. His dream is to one day have the time to create amazing furniture like that. We were really glad we got to go and bring Tyler's brother and my parents too.
Oh we also had a great weekend to open Spring Break. Tyler's parents came up to Logan and spoiled our butts off! They took us bowling. Tyler and his dad both got Turkeys!! Like father like son. They also took us out to a wonderful dinner at Ruby Tuesday. Then, thanks to Natalie and Neil and Jill, we all got to go to the last Aggie game, which as you know was amazing. Let's hope our Aggies keep doing great! We concluded that fun day at Tyler's parent's hotel where we played an exciting game of Oodles of Doodles.
(This picture isn't actually from this weekend, but it's a pretty cool one of my awesome in-laws!)
We also spent some good quality time doing one of our favorite things....playing games. We got together with Nat and Luke of Friday to play Banana Grams and Carcassonne. On Saturday we had our friends Whitney and Tyler over for games and phazookies. We had so much fun with them playing good games and even teaching them some new ones. I wish they weren't moving away soon. Whit, how about if you guys just stay here?
(This is just a google pictures too, but I actually have played all those games except Outwit. The Tamagotchi one is actually pretty fun)
The rest of this week has consisted of homework and movies and lots of relaxing. We have loved every second of this no-school thing. We concluded our wonderful week with a nice Sunday walk. This is about the only activity we managed to take pictures at. I whole-heartily tried to get pictures this week! I brought my camera....but kept forgetting the memory card.

Yup, we're still here.

Tyler and I are still alive and doing good. After my amazing internship at RR Donnelley ended I began the job search and was lucky (or should I say blessed) to find a job only a week later. I'm working in the Dean's office in the Business building. I'm an assistant to the secretary of the Dean...so yeah, I'm a peon, but hey, it works. I actually have liked it so far. I guess it's pretty cool that I'm working in the tallest building in Logan on the second to highest floor. What more can you ask for right?

Tyler is still working at the survey place and he says it's okay. I guess it's about as good as a job like that can be. We're both very glad that this semester is passing by so quickly and looking forward for a few days free of homework (and work for me) during Spring Break.

The warm weather is a nice change. It reminds me of last year when we got engaged, so it brings welcomed reminiscent feelings.

We have pretty much grown out of our apartment. I am getting really anxious to move this summer. I tried to take a picture of our apartment to give those of you who haven't seen it an idea of what it's like, but it's hard to get a good perspective because you can't step back far enough to even get a picture of an entire wall. Here's our living room, it's just big enough for a couch. We shuffle the coffee table and banana chair around a lot. Also you can see our kitchen table(s) there. Yup, the TV trays. Our dream is to one day have room for a real kitchen table. Here's a view of our kitchen. That lovely blue linoleum you see on the floor is the same material they used on the counter tops. It actually does give the kitchen quite a bit of personality.
Here's the mysterious foot print that's in the doorway of our bedroom. I think whoever finished the floor got a little excited and walked on it too soon.
There's a peek of our apartment. It actually is adorable and it's been great for us. But it's definitely time for a bigger place real soon!

You know you need a new car when.....

Well, Tyler and I had yet another grand adventure yesterday. It began with a text from Tyler asking where the switch was to swap between the front tank and the back tank of the truck. I knew right away that the truck was dead. Sure enough it would not start. I wasn't too disappointed cuz I thought maybe this was our chance to get a new car, but at the same time it isn't in our plan until the summer.
Well, I left work to pick up Tyler and bring him to work. After he got off work we tried to start the car again.....and it "worked"! I suggested that he drive it around the block to warm it up and make sure it was okay. So we hoped in the truck and began on our quest.

Well, it only took about five seconds for the truck to mal-function again. All of a sudden the gas pedal was stuck completely to the floor. We were zooming of out control and I was certain we were nearing our death. Well, it's been a good life, I love you all, see you on the other side.... But lucky for me Tyler is able to handle situations like this much more rationally than I am, so he threw the car in neutral as it continued to rev at full throttle. He tried to pull the gas pedal back up or apply the brakes, but it was all to no avail.

Well it turns out the gas cable was frozen or something. I'm not sure if we really know what happened, but the truck began working like "normal" again. We'll drive it with caution...as we always have. I guess now we really have no doubt that we'll get a new car this summer. We were hoping to get a little bit of cash for it but I think I've concluded that my little truck is destined to become a demolition derby car.

Viewer Discretion Advised

So Tyler was faithfully doing the dishes the other night and I was on the computer in the other "room" when I heard Tyler yell from the kitchen, "AHh! I did it!" Our drinking glasses are squarish and too small for Tyler's hands to fit in them when he cleans them. He's always said that one day he would be washing the dishes and he would break a glass and cut his hand off. Well, didn't quite cut his hand off, he only just about cut his pinky off. Well, really it wasn't that bad, but as you can see below he sliced into it pretty good. We got him all cleaned up and it's actually healing pretty well now. Had we had insurance I think he would have gotten stitches. Right when this happened I told Tyler he was never allowed to do dishes again...then I realized that was a little drastic so I settled for never letting him wash those glasses again.

Water, a simple pleasure.

We had a really "fun" experience on Monday. I woke up to get ready for the first day back at school. I went to take a shower and as I turned on the faucet...no water came out. I immediately called our landlady because they pay for the water. She checked with the utility company and assured us that the water was paid and turned on. After several other calls to our landlady and talking to a few people I concluded that most likely our pipes had frozen. After school and work, I returned home to attempt to solve to the problem. Our landlady was not much help so took the endeavor into our own hands. Tyler spent nearly 45 minutes in the utility room aiming my blow dryer at our frozen pipes. After all that time it seemed that the hot air was doing nothing but making us more frustrated. We had just about given up when we thought to call our home teachers. One of them is an apartment manager at a different complex and we thought he may be able to help. While Tyler was on the phone with him I heard something in the bathroom. I ran in there and there was brown water flowing out of the faucet. I had never been happier to see flowing brown water! After about 20 seconds it cleared up and we were back to enjoying modern plumbing.
While this experience was frustrating it was also a testimony to us of a few things. First of all, we were glad that we were prepared with food storage. I don't know what we would have done if we did not have water saved up. It was a testimony to us that you really never know when you might need food storage, but you are infinitely grateful when you do have it! Also, we felt blessed because after doing all we could to get our pipes unfrozen it took calling our home teachers to fix the problem. Sometimes it just takes blind faith. We were really grateful for this experience, and now even more grateful for running water. Needless to say we now leave the faucet dripping every night.

Christmas in Bountiful/Centerville

Christmas to us this year meant going home and spending lots of time with our family. We tried to equally split our time between Tyler's family and mine. We feel lucky that our families are so close and we can spend holidays with both families. We played a lot of board games and went to a few white elephant parties including the famous Mug Exchange on Christmas Eve. Tyler and I thought the mug exchange was a success because we didn't make any little kids cry, unlike last year. We spent some time with my Uncle Dave and got to hear him beautifully play his saxophone. On Christmas morning Santa came to Tyler's parents house and then we went to my house to open presents. I think Tyler was surprised by how long that took. We went to Tyler's family party where we enjoyed great food and had fun hanging out with his cousins and such. Then to my grandma's house for more food and fun. My parents gave us a lot a lot of food storage and we got some things we need and even some that will just be fun like lots of movies and the first season of the Office! We really enjoyed having so many days off work and being able to relax and really enjoy being with family. It was a wonderful Christmas

Our Cheap Christmas Decorations

Next up on the adgenda was Christmas. Since this was our first Christmas being married we decided we needed to put up some decorations, but we don't wanna buy a lot of stuff yet since we don't have room to store anything. Tyler's mom gave us a little tree and some decorations. We set up pretty late on December 22nd but kept it up through the new year.

A cut the star out of a piece of paper!We also hung some lights that are suppose to be draped over bushes outside. Yeah, white trash, I know but it helped us feel more like Christmas. And our stockings are hanging there too. Mine is a reindeer and Tyler's mom cross-stitched his. He's really proud of it.
My mom gave us this little nativity set. We really liked it and put it on top of our tv.

One of the traditions we started this year was to read the Christmas story from the scriptures by candle light. It was humbling and helped us feel the Christmas story and focus on Christ.