We Are Grateful--Family Home Evening Lesson

We just had a family home evening lesson on gratitude and realized that we are super grateful for our parents. Here are a few reasons why:

• financial support
• unconditional love
• driving us around as kids
• sacrificing for us since birth
• wisdom and advice
• homes full of love
• being raised with the gospel and good values
• giving us opportunities to learn who we are
• still being our parents, even after we've left home
• patience
• and for all the other things that we can't write down

Thank you to both our parents!

Schools Out!

I finished my advance writing course last week. My job is also over until the Fall semester starts up. So I have a lot of free time. Keeping in mind the little guy in my stomach, this is probably the last time in my life I will have this much free time, so I've decided to be grateful instead of bored. Here's the last week and a half at a glance:

• Kyle and I both worked a lot
• We went to our niece's 1st birthday party
• We got the last book in the Twilight series and spend way too much time reading it every night.
• Kyle worked on his Independent Study class most of Saturday...I was bored out of my mind most of Saturday
• We read together all day Sunday, only taking a break for dinner and church
• I cleaned the apartment all day Monday. You'd think after a whole day cleaning that the place would be clean, it's not true. Kyle came home and helped clean some more, now it's almost all the way clean, that's how dirty it was. That's more than I should admit online.
• We went up the canyon one night and had a dutch oven dinner...delicious.
• My mother-in-law came in town and brought us 3 lbs. of blueberries that she had picked in Oregon. The blueberries are already gone; Kyle is kind of sad about that.

We are still trying to name the kid in my stomach, so if you have any good ideas we're ready to listen.

Kyle's first Post

My turn! Here are some pictures of the latest activities that we have been involved with:

These are some pictures of us at a nearby outdoor amphitheater where we watched the movie Dan in Real Life.

We also arrived at our 1st year anniversary and although we are going to celebrate it in a couple of weeks we went to a pottery shop and painted a vase and a dragon. Hooray!!
We decided that from now on it would be more economical to just celebrate things on the actually date that way you don't end up doing things on both days and spending more money. : )

1st Anniversary

It's kind of crazy that a whole year has gone by! (We were married on Aug. 4th.) What was even weirder is the next day when I realized I was in my second year of marriage. I think it's like turning 21 or going to college. Once you hit that marker you are kind of at a loss of what to do with yourself, because you've never looked beyond. So here I am in the world beyond, and I'm glad to be spending it with Kyle.

Things I've learned from the first year of marriage (in no particular order):
1. When single friends complain that they'll never see you again because you are getting married it's really their fault. They stop calling you or inviting you to do things.
2. In my family, the lid disappears off the milk carton faster than brownies get eaten. In reality, the milk should have the lid on it for the full lifespan of the carton. This is a new concept to me; Kyle is helping me sort through this discovery.
3. Switching which side of the bed you sleep on is okay.
4. It's not the 1st year of marriage that is hard. The hard part is introducing a baby (or pregnancy) into the picture.
5. Don't think about whose fault it is, that isn't important.
6. It's okay if your life isn't like TV and you actually love your in-laws.
7. At some point you want to start spending time with other couples (this has taken us awhile), then you have to remember who you know that is also in a relationship. And then you start wishing you had more friends.
8. When you leave the place a mess, it's still a mess when you come back.

9. Yes, we are still idiots together after a whole year of marriage! See picture below for proof.

10. Love grows when you're not looking. (We had a kissing picture, but Kyle didn't approve of it going on the internet, so if you're glad to not have to look at it, thank Kyle!)
11. As much as people like to joke about re-gifting and wedding registries, you really do get a lot of useful stuff at your wedding. So thanks everyone for contributing to a great 1st year of marriage!
12. We aren't as smart as we think. We end up calling our parents with questions about cooking or cleaning or taxes or loans about every other week. Thank goodness for parents!