my place.

you know that heart-tickling, overflowing feeling of love you get sometimes?

like when you hear the star-spangled banner?

or when you've just spent an entire saturday morning cleaning your apartment and right after you throw the last clorox wipe away, you stand back and look at the whole place as it sparkles?

or when you're watching the sound of music and you see maria running back to the von trapp's house? 

or when it's the last day of school and you're so proud of yourself and your classmates for all you accomplished together?  

i get that same sense of pride and love when i see pictures of BYU. 

aren't those pretty?

i can't take credit for any of them. 

but i thought they were too good to not share! 

sometimes i walk around campus silently making fun of the nerdy mo-mo freaks around me, counting the weeks until i can graduate and leave. but most of the time, i walk around feeling so happy and so blessed. i love my school. 

happy 4th of july!

... 20 days later. 

listen. i know i'm late, but our independence day wasn't exactly "festive and blog worthy."

but then i thought to myself, how could i not document our first married 4th of july? 

what if i'm 85 years old and a little granddaughter sitting on my knee asks, "gramma, what did you and grandpa do to celebrate your first fourth of july as a married couple?" and i am forced sit there with furrowed brows, scratching my forehead trying to recall that historic event from decades and decades past? instead, i will pull out a very thick book compiled with all of my blog posts, flip right to july 2012, and read her this ancient account: 

for our first ever married fourth of july, scotty and i both had the day off of work. we could do whatever we wanted! we have passes to seven peaks burning a hole in our pockets, a pool in our apartment complex, friends and family galore. what did we do, you ask? 

well. we started off with a delicious breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, and potatoes. scotty has been quite the experimental chef lately. we traveled off to home depot and target. (what kind of "day off" is it if you don't go to target?) and for the whole rest of the afternoon, we painted our dining room table. 

... and it looks great! 

it sure is a wonderful feeling to have matching things.  

we rented a movie, didn't see a single firework, and didn't even smell a bbq. 

it was a little unorthodox, i'll admit. 

but i also admit that sometimes you just need a catch-up day! 

i promise we love our country.  

animals

i've never been much of an animal person. 

we didn't have pets growing up.

i wasn't really even around pets growing up. 

my extreme fear of dogs up until age 12 didn't really help. 

sure, we had a pet turtle for a couple years. but once my family gave her away, my heart was broken and i decided i will never have room to love another animal. (click here for that sad saga) 

every time someone pins this on pinterest i laugh. 

... because, yeah. i don't like dogs. 

and people do question the existence of my heart and soul. 

i don't like horses, cats, birds. i HATE snakes and lizards and slimy things. 

i'm not one of those people who wants to go save abused or orphaned animals, i don't get emotional about animal deaths, and i yawn through animal movies. one time i told my mom that i would be fine if every other animal was wiped off the face of the earth except for cows and chickens. i love my burgers. and you can't have a cafe rio chicken salad without the chicken! 

with all of that being said, can i contradict myself and show you this picture? 

SERIOUSLY? how am i supposed to stay strong in my animal-boycott when i come across pictures like this on pinterest? my current hobby is googling "baby bulldog" and forcing scotty to look at every single picture with me. 

vegas highlights

last weekend we went to vegas!
and when i say "went to vegas" what i really mean is...
spent friday at the lake with family, sandwiches, and surprisingly wonderful weather,

had a delicious BBQ with marx fam (the burgers and company did not disappoint!),
surprised my mom friday night and listened to her laugh out of complete shock and happiness,

took my parents for a joyride in our new car,
(they approved)

purchased four boxes of red velvet cafe chocolate chip cookies,
(mouth is watering as i type that)

tried to alleviate our lake burns with an aloe vera plant my mom has growing in her kitchen,

and watched my 45-year old mother open her 45 presents.

 this was one of them:

 and 6 others were tickets to phantom of the opera.

 scotty was obviously so excited to go!

sunday i woke up and drove over to leah's house. we needed some quality catching up time! we didn't take a picture because we were half sleeping which meant no makeup/unbrushed hair. plus, there was no time to take a picture. too much to talk about. so here is a classic one of us :)

on the drive back we made a pit stop in st george to eat dinner with our favorite cruise friends! we enjoyed a delicious roast, a quick loud pouring rainstorm, card games, and lots of laughs. once again, i failed to take a picture. but here is my attractive husband sitting outside of their apartment

 and the grand finale, on the last stretch, just under 20 miles away from reaching our home,

 we were pulled over by a bored police man and his trainee.

 "you had a hard time staying between the lines back there!"
"do you not realize we've been driving for 6 hours and we just want to go home and sleep in our own bed and take a shower and prepare ourselves to wake up at 6:00 AM tomorrow to endure a whole week of work after a fun-filled family weekend in las vegas?!"
... okay maybe that was just a thought going through my head.

but we got off with a warning, which meant that the entire trip, start to finish, was a complete success!

enjoy every car wash

one of my many flaws is that i don't appreciate the things i have.

usually i end up appreciating them after they are gone, or when i no longer have access to them.

it's like the saying goes... "you don't know what you have 'til it's gone."

cases in point:

i didn't really appreciate my parents until i moved away

i never knew how luxurious free laundry services were until i had to pay $2.25 a load

i didn't appreciate michael jackson's music until after he died (long live the king of pop)

i didn't realize how great high school "homework" was until my all-nighters in college

... and more recently, i never appreciated a functional car window until after i survived the worst car wash of my life. 

let's back up.

you know the whole "carefree girl driving a convertible on a curvy road overlooking the beach, with her hair flying in the wind, music blasting, huge sunglasses" kind of idea? the standard imaginary oasis every girl holds dear to her heart? 

... every girl except me.

that sounds more like a nightmare than day dream. i absolutely hate driving with windows down. oh it makes me nuts! i hate everything about it.

i hate my hair getting blown out of place

i hate smelling the unknown smells of the outside

i hate feeling like a bug could fly into my car at any given second

i hate hearing other people's music

i hate feeling vulnerable- like anyone could throw anything into the car (click here)

it's just not my thing. 

the only time i drive with a window down is when i'm at sonic ordering my route 44 dr pepper.

... so naturally, my driver's side window broke. one day i rolled it down, and it did not roll back up. i had to drive from provo to midvale with tears dried to my face as the wind, bugs, and smells attacked me.

my husband is a good man. he took apart my whole door and literally pulled the window back up. this was good for the time being, but still broken. 

a few days later i decided to give my car some loving and headed over to the car wash. 

i thought, maybe my car would be nicer to me if i took better care of her. 

... or maybe she would take revenge on me. 

i was helpless. pathetic. water and soap were spraying out of the small crack above my window. i'm sure people in nearby cities could hear my squealing.  no matter how many times i repeated, "no! no! no no no!", the liquids kept coming. 

i left with soggy leggings and a broken heart. every second of those four or five minutes i sat in the car wash tunnel was just horrible.

the final product: the outside of my window was squeaky clean while the inside was now spotted and smeared.

for the rest of my life, i will enjoy every successful car wash and try to recognize how lucky i am for the little victories in my life. 

crepe carnival

sometimes working is a drag.

not my jobs, specifically. 

but just working in general. 

you know?

like... "what do you mean i have to wake up at 6:20 a.m. and get all dressed up in nice professional clothes and wear heels and commute 40 minutes to work and be customer friendly and have manners all day and do whatever i'm asked to with a smile for 8 hours straight and then drive home in rush-hour traffic with all of the other frantic employees who just want to go home and won't share the road with me and then rush off to a two-hour religion class and be fully attentive and take notes so i don't fail and then drive home to fall asleep out of exhaustion only to wake up the next morning and repeat the whole stressful pattern all over again?" 

when it could be like... "i slept in this morning until 9:30, went for a beautiful jog up in a park and stopped at the local farmers market to pick up some produce and drop lunch off to my sweet husband at work and gave him a big juicy kiss, then i went home and made some fresh rolls for our pot roast dinner while the laundry was going and by the time my husband got home i had dinner on the table and all of the chores done. we had the whole evening to eat chocolate covered strawberries and snuggle up on the couch to watch our favorite tv shows or a good movie." 

... but, the bills must be paid. and in all honesty it could be worse.

it could be a lot worse. 

even though i don't have the luxury of staying home all day doing whatever i want, i am so lucky and blessed to work with the most amazing people and be a part of the most amazing university. i love BYU and i am having fun getting to know all of my coworkers. (especially lauren harris who is not pictured below because we were on opposite lunch shifts). we keep the work days exciting by having themed lunch days or other festivities. 

last week's excitement was "crepe carnival" 

 

 ... it could be worse!

a sunday thought

last week, scotty and i attended a little church training meeting.  the meeting was to help us become better primary teachers. one of the points made was "you need to be excited about the gospel so the children in your class will be excited too."  the presenter referred to this excitement as being "fired up" and asked us to write down the #1 thing about the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints that gets us "fired up."  without missing a beat, i clicked my pen and wrote down, "families can be together forever." 

i LOVE that promise! my favorite favorite favorite thing about the church is that i have the opportunity to live with my husband, kids, parents, brothers, grandparents, cousins, aunts, uncles, in-laws, and all other relatives for the rest of eternity! 

my sweet little cousin charity got baptized yesterday. i adore her. we are all so proud of her for making the decision to get baptized. her baptism was a great reminder of what i should be doing and the promises that i made when i was baptized (back in january 1999). after every family gathering, i leave feeling so lucky and so happy. i want every single loved one and every single relative to be together in heaven after this life. "no empty chairs."

i couldn't stand being without the people i love! 

click here to listen to my favorite church song that makes me tear up almost every time. 

i love my family, and the fact that i can live with them forever.

it just gets me so fired up!