Turning over a new leaf, or resurrecting an old one

Bill and I are a pretty active couple. Well, we usually are. While we were engaged we got kind of lazy. There were so many things to plan and so many commitments, that we just stopped planning extra things to do for fun and just kind of let life lead us along for a few months. We've been married for a month-and-a-half now, though, and we've spent the last couple weeks getting back into the groove of our active and more disciplined lifestyle.

Here's a few of the things we've done of late.

1. Started training for the St. George Marathon. It's my fourth, Bill's first, and I don't think I can really call myself a Utah Marathoner unless I've run this race, Boston Marathoner or not. Cross your fingers that we get picked to run it in May when they have the drawing.

2. Mostly finished decorating our apartment. We still have some pictures to put up from our wedding, but we picked out our duvet cover for our bed, hung some pictures, and outfitted our kitchen as much as we're going to at the moment.



























3. Went mountaineering with our friends the Johnsons a weekend ago. We hiked/snowshoe'd up a good majority of Lone Peak. We shoe-skied half the way down since it was so steep. It was tons of fun.












4. Hiked to Stewart Falls from the Aspen Grove Trailhead last Friday night. We had a busy day/evening, so we didn't get up there until 9:30pm and got back to the car at midnight. As we were leaving, a car of college guys drove up and started the hike. They were about as ill-equipped to hike it as you can be as it's still super snowy and icy up there. They had weak sauce shoes on and hardly any coats and just big flashlights to see. Bill and I seriously wondered if they'd make it back safe, but I didn't hear anything so I think they must have been fine.

5. Saturday we went shooting with Vince and Megan, Bill's brother and his fiance and after our stake conference that evening went out to Tucano's for dinner. What a fun trip! Vince has lots of guns, so we had a great time shooting out on the other side of Utah Lake.





















It feels good to be active again. I hate feeling lazy and unproductive. I'm not working full-time anymore, as of the first of the year, so it's been nice to have the chance to sleep in a lot and have a more relaxing lifestyle. I'm happy to be speeding up the pace again though. Now if I can only get the letter from BYU saying (cross your fingers) that I've been accepted into my grad program, things will be just about perfect.

Weird Formatting

So posting a bunch of wedding photos really made the formatting of my blog weird. I'll have to fix that soon. Not tonight though!

Some of my favorite wedding photos

I got 2 DVDs with 808 photos from the wedding. Yeah, that's right, 808 photos. And you know what? Most of them were awesome! Here's a bunch of my favorites, but this is seriously a drop in the bucket of all the photos we have.

Pictures are finally coming!

I'm picking up my wedding pictures after work tonight! I'm so excited!

Anyone want to comment?

So I'm still waiting for two more people to comment on my last post so I can make you something. I promise it'll be good. :)

Pay it Forward

Pay it forward...
The rules
1. Be one of the first THREE (3) bloggers to leave a comment on this post, which then entitles you to a handmade item from me - something crafty or yummy, only I know.
2. Winners must post this challenge on their blog, meaning that they will Pay IT Forward, creating a handmade gift- anything! for the first THREE (3) bloggers who leave a comment on their post about the giveaway!
3. The gift that you send to your friends can be from any price range and you have 365 days to make and/ or ship your item. This means you should be willing to maintain your blog at least until you receive your gift and have shipped your gifts. And, remember: it's the spirit and the thought that counts!
4. When you receive your gift, feel free to post about it, sharing appropriate pictures and comments! If you are not one of the first three to comment on this post, you can still play along. Go ahead and start your own Pay It Forward chain, and encourage your friends to do the same!
SO, REMEMBER...Pay It Forward!
Let's help make this a wonderful world to live in and show our friends how much we care for them :)

I just bought tickets to Cancun!

Bill and I are going to Cancun in April after school gets out! Woot, woot! We're so excited! The best part is that we only have to pay for our tickets there and everything else is paid for by a trip we won. Woohoo! Tickets are super cheap right now and we got both our tickets for about $650, as opposed to the $1100 we saw just a couple weeks ago. Yay for prices going down!

The Conservatory Overcoat GIVEAWAY!!!!

The Conservatory Overcoat GIVEAWAY!!!!

Mary Kay

Last week I decided to start selling Mary Kay. What with hoping to be in grad school in the Fall (I'm still waiting to hear back from my program), and not being able to work during the year if I do get in, I feel like I need a different way to earn money that I can do on my schedule instead of set hours. I've been using Mary Kay products for years, and I love them, so I figured it was a good option. If you want to buy some products, I can hook you up. Or I can do a free facial for you so you can try out the products. They're pretty awesome, so I highly recommend it. Just drop me a line if you're interested.

On a brighter note...

So although I'm feeling exceptionally poor today, it is nice to actually have the time to blog about last weekend. My parents and Bill and I caravaned out to the Springs on Friday to be there in time for our open house on Saturday. We decorated the church Friday night with the help of some wonderful friends that still live there. Nannette and Clay Jones hosted the weekend for us and they were just so generous and wonderful about everything! We stayed at their house all weekend and Clay made us the most amazing salmon Saturday night! What a great family they are.

After decorating on Friday, Bill and I headed over to the Black's house to spend some time with Kirsten, my best friend, who also drove in for the open house. It was so wonderful to get to spend some time with her! She just moved to Craig, CO from Texas so I'm very glad that she's closer by so we can go visit them. I wish we could always live near each other, but sadly, that's definitely not the case.

Ever since my parents moved to Utah last year, I've felt just a little displaced. I wasn't really sure what to call home anymore, because I've now lived in Utah for almost as long as I lived in Colorado. Going there this weekend totally sealed the deal for me. I'm definitely a Coloradan at heart and am always going to be. I love that place!

Saturday morning I took Bill to Garden of the Gods. We didn't get to stay for very long, but we did hike around a little bit. Rock climbing there is a reason unto itself to make a trip back to the Springs.

The open house turned out great. Not too many people were able to make it, but that was actually nice because we got to talk more in-depth with the ones that did come. It was really nice and just an awesome trip. After the open house we had a good time opening our presents. We've gotten more presents over the last few weeks that I've gotten in years. It's been a fun month, that's for sure.

Who knew you could catch the flu through the Internet!

So I came home from work last night feeling rather poorly. I'd spaced out my eating throughout the day a little far, plus I'd stopped by the gym and exercised on the way home, so I thought my body was just signaling to me that I needed to eat and it was unhappy with me. The being unhappy with me part was true, but not for the reason I thought. By the time I got home I had a pounding headache and was feeling nauseous. I get the flu so rarely that I really didn't recognize the symptoms at all until I tried to eat several times throughout the evening and progressively threw it all up.

Last night was pretty much the longest night of my life. I didn't throw up anymore, but sleep didn't come so easily and it was just miserable. I was hoping to be better today but no such luck. I've spent the day mostly camped out on my couch sleeping as doing anything else seems to trigger me throwing up again. Not fun! Hopefully this is one of those 24-hour bugs and it will be gone later today, but it's sure hanging around for the moment. I think the last time I threw up was probably 5 years ago. It just doesn't happen to me. I get lots of other kinds of sick, but not nauseous. I have no idea what I'm going to do when I'm pregnant, because I pretty much hate this feeling with a burning passion.

My parents were super nice to stop by and bring me some groceries so that I could find something to eat. It was really nice to have them come. They moved to Utah a little over a year ago, and having them so close in the area is awesome!

So I've decided to place blame on my sister Tori and her family for this sickness. They are currently suffering from the flu themselves, all the way out in Pennsylvania, and she blogged about it last night. I didn't get sick until after I read it, so that obviously means that the flu can be contracted through the Internet. I even got a flu shot this year! So much for that. Just kidding! I actually feel really bad for her, as I think they're strain is quite a lot worse than mine. All I can say is, "I know how you feel little sister!"

Hello to anyone transferring to my new blog!

So here it is, my new, oh wait, the same blog. My little sister was highly amused when she got married and only had to add a line and a loop to her last name, as it changed from Jones to James. I've finally beaten her at that game! My new blog address is the same except for one little - . Woot!

Okay, that was a random paragraph, but I'm feeling kind of random tonight so it fits. Welcome all and I hope you enjoy my posts to come!

Honeymooning

So Bill and I have decided that it's a really good thing that we got married, because together we've discovered we're quite lucky. I don't think I've won a single contest in my entire life, and neither has Bill. Since we got engaged, we've managed to get ourselves 3 trips and won a bunch of free stuff. In August we're going to San Diego for a couple days. The plane tickets and hotel are all paid for, plus a free dinner.

In May we're going to Cancun. We have a 2-night 3-day trip with hotel and all entertainment and food paid for. We have to buy the plane tickets, but that's what tax returns are for, right?

Oh, and we have a couple nights at a hotel paid for in Lake Tahoe if we want to do it sometime before August. As you can see, we're a little busy, so that might not happen, but that won't be the worst thing in the world.

What with all these great trips this year, and since Bill had to be back at work and school on Tuesday this week, we took just a couple days for our honeymoon and went up to Ogden for Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. We planned to go snowboarding and possibly to to this indoor adventure center that has rock climbing, a surfing machine, and indoor sky diving, plus a snowshoeing trip, but once we were up there we ended up doing more relaxing than all the activities. Sunday we did get to go snowshoeing up Ogden Canyon. It was tons of fun. We found a little canyon to hike up and climbed up to the top of one of the sides. It was beautiful!


We would have gone snowboarding Monday, but it hasn't snowed for a few weeks, and I've never been snowboarding, so learning on ice just didn't sound like that much fun. Instead we went to a movie, Marley and Me, and wandered around old town Ogden.

We visited antique shops and cute furniture stores and that kind of thing. We found a cute little coffee shop to get hot chocolate at. On the way down to Provo stopped by IKEA to go shopping. I love that store! We didn't have as much time as we wanted, so we'll definitely be making a return trip sometimes soon.

Monday night we decided to invite all our family still in town to come over and watch us open our wedding gifts. It was so fun! My brother Mark and his family came and Tori and her family as well as my parents and sister Natasha that live here in town. I was glad I got to see them before they left, since I don't see them very often.

I have to say it was a perfect honeymoon. Not super long, but so relaxing and so fun and just what I wanted. As one of my college professors and dear friends told me, every vacation together is a honeymoon, so this was just the first of many in years to come. Next on the list: Cancun!!!

Wedding Bliss

So I've been married for 5 days now, and let me tell you, being married is great! The wedding turned out so wonderful! I can't give enough thanks to mine and Bill's families for making sure everything was perfect.

And it sure took some effort. The reception was particularly troublesome. You'd think with all the churches in Utah county, it wouldn't be difficult to schedule one for a reception. Not so! My lovely visiting teacher pulled through for us and got us into her parent's building, which happens to be a stake center. We were scheduled for Saturday afternoon for our reception, but not any other times to decorate. We didn't realize that would be a problem until we found out that there was a youth basketball tournament that morning. No problem though, we'd just decorate the walls the night before and quickly move the stuff in between the sealing and the reception, right? No! Because since we weren't scheduled for Friday night to decorate, a singles dance got bumped up at the very last minute from a church down the road who had double-scheduled. There we were with our entire family at the church eating dinner, ready to decorate, and instead we had to leave everything and vacate the premises for the dance. I made a conscious choice not to be stressed about everything, and just enjoy all the events, so I did surprisingly fine, but Bill was stressed out of his mind. When he got to the church after a full day of school and work Friday, he had to eat and unwind without a billion people around before he could face everyone. Poor guy! I had the day off and had gone and gotten pampered with my sisters, mom, and sister/mother-in-law with manicures and pedicures, so I was as stress-free as you can get in the situation.

So my sister-in-law Hillary deserves an award for the best sister-in-law ever. She is studying interior design, and she took over all the reception plans and got it set up in between the 11am sealing and the 4pm reception. Way to go! She put fliers on all the doors of the guys in her ward and got a bunch of them to show up and decorate. It turned out beautiful! Nevermind that our centerpiece flowers froze in the fridge overnight and were black and limp when they arrived. They went and bought some roses and it was just beautiful.

Wedding day was amazing all around. The weather was beautiful. Warm and sunny (well, 40ish degrees. That's warm in Utah in January :) ) and just perfect. I got my hair done at 7:30 am and then headed up to the Salt Lake temple with my sister and niece. All of my siblings were there for the wedding, save for one who I saw two days before. I couldn't have asked for a better present than to have them all there, although the present they got us was really nice too. :) Bill and I sat and waited in the celestial room for probably half an hour instead of the few minutes we expected because we found out after that the girl getting sealed before us had forgotten her dress. Poor girl! So our sealing ended up being at 11:20 instead of 11am. It was wonderful. A family friend of Bill's parents sealed us and it was amazing, just like I knew it would be. My two best friends came with their husbands, plus some of my dear friends that still live here in Utah, and of course my family and Bill's. My grandparents were there, which was just great, and I was pleasantly surprised to have Bill's grandma come up all the way from Tempe, AZ to attend, as did several of my aunts and uncles.

Our photographer and videographer are a couple that we got connected to from one of my old roommates. They are amazing! They spent a couple hours with us taking pictures at the temple, and then came down to our reception just because they wanted to, as it wasn't a part of their contract. Thanks Nickell and Aaron!

After we finished taking pictures, we headed down to Provo for the reception. Just as we were passing Sandy I realized I had forgotten my bouquet at the temple. I was so sad! But my aunt and uncle came to the rescue and went up and picked them up and brought them down in time for me to have them for the last half our the reception. You are amazing Paul and Bonnie!

Like I said, the reception was wonderful. So many good friends and family came and it was just so fun to see them and do all the fun things like cut the cake and throw a bouquet and garter. Bill and I danced together and then I got to dance with my dad and with Bill's dad, who is already like another dad to me. I just love his family! I couldn't ask for better in-laws. They're fun and generous and so accepting of me and I just love them!

What a wonderful day! It was definitely everything I could have hoped and dreamed for my wedding, and the fact that I'm married to the most amazing guy in the world sure makes it even better!

I'm back from my blogging hiatus

It's been a busy few weeks, seeing that the wedding is in 5 days!!!! I'm just a tad excited, if you can't tell. :) Lots has happened since we got back from Christmas in Las Vegas.

Bill and I moved into our new apartment. Well, we moved me and all our stuff in, and he sleeps at his brother's house a few blocks away, but only for one more week. Yay! It is so nice to have our own place! Married housing is a lot less hectic and crazy than single student housing, and I'm loving the change. Here's a picture of Bill in our living room this morning about to leave. He's going to love that I posted this. :)




Last night Bill and I, with the helpful mentoring of my super cute old roommate Becky, created a wedding cake out of a foam mold for our wedding on Saturday. So much fun! Since cakes run upwards of $300, we decided we'd do a fake cake and then have a little one to cut. We finished 2 of the three layers and it looks awesome! See for yourself.


It's going to have red and silver ribbon and flowers on it at the reception, so it'll be even better this weekend. Fun times!