Finals are coming....

....the house is getting messy. Please bring us food, as we are starving [because there is no time for grocery shopping]. If you haven't got any food then an SOS text will do. If you can't send a text, then good vibes will do!

(hummed to the tune of "Christmas is Coming [the goose is getting fat...you know, that one]).

anyone out there?

well, it has been a while....life has gotten busy! anyone else agree? for one of my classes this semester we are required to post our thoughts on a weekly blog. while i was doing it tonight, i remembered mine and don's little blog. so, in an effort to continue avoiding reading a highly boring interesting article for my class tomorrow night, here i am. when i read people's blogs, i like to look at their pictures. i assume you're probably the same. while we have taken quite a few pictures in the last 6 months, none of them will appear tonight. sorry! if you are done reading, i understand.

here's a recap of where we've been the last 6 months...

March:

• we celebrated our 1 year anniversary (wow, that year went fast!)
• we moved into a new apartment in the village (married student housing)

May:

• Don graduated with a bachelor's of arts in political science and asian studies at the university of utah
• Jen started her first semester of graduate school at the university of utah in the idet (instructional design and educational technology) program
• Don started an internship in the governor's office

June and July:

• we caught up on some much needed r & r
• went camping with some friends in wyoming
• visited don's aunt and uncle in connecticut
• met up with jen's family in rochester, ny to see some of the church history sites
• visited niagara falls
• visited bear lake

August:

• we cried a little at the thought of how fast the summer went
• don accepted a full time job at the governor's office as a policy assistant
• jen went back to school teaching 3rd grade 
• jen and don started fall semester at the u in their respective grad programs

September:

• we moved (yes, again...) to an adorable apartment in the capitol hill area
• don can walk to work in 2 minutes
• jen can walk to work in 5
• we only have 2 boxes left to unpack!!
• we celebrated our 18 month anniversary (again, time is flying)

the next time i am procrastinating homework i will post pictures!!!

Sleeping Well Tonight

The last few months, weeks and especially days have been a whirlwind! Nearly a year ago, we started figuring out what we would be doing for grad school. Where we would go....when we would go...if we would go at the same time...etc. We visited a few out of state schools, did alot of research for various programs and came to the conclusion that we would try to stay in Utah for school so that we could both get our masters degrees at the same time. Then came all of the applications complete with essays (tons of them), recommendation letters and alot of waiting (4 months to be exact, ah!). I am happy to announce that we finally, finally, finally have all of our plans finalized....(a good way to kick off our One-Year-Anniversary-Weekend).

....Don will be doing a MPA (Masters in Public Administration) at the U (contrary to the original plan of law school)....
....I will be doing a Masters of Education through the Educational Psychology department focusing on Instructional Design and Educational Technology which includes a Multimedia Endorsement (kind of a mouthful!)...
....and the best news of all, we have full-ride scholarships! (Don received an amazing scholarship called the FLAS which is a foreign language scholarship that allows students to do an intensive study of a foreign language and Asian culture alongside their normal course work.).

We are extremely blessed. Extremely!! And, we are looking forward to a good's night sleep! (The first in many weeks). We are now gearing up for moving in 2 weeks, which is another story for another night. It involves a crumbling balcony and our relocation 200 feet away.

Gardening...

For whatever reason, I have become obsessed with the idea of gardening. Apparently when you get married you all of the sudden become domestic and like to do things such as cooking and gardening--both of which I had absolutely zero interest in growing up. Our apartment complex has a community garden that you can rent a space in for the summer. Last summer we couldn't do it because we were in DC for 3 months, so I have been looking forward to this for nearly a year! 

Luckily, my mother-in-law and I have been taking a gardening class at Red Butte Gardens, which has been helpful. However, you know its bad when you are in the beginning gardening class and still at times don't know what the teacher is talking about! I have started the "early crops" in trays in our kitchen. I won't mention that it has taken up half of our counter space, and at the moment just looks like trays of dirt soil. 

This is going to be a grand adventure! And for those that know me, a great exercise of patience!! More to come on that...once the seeds decide to sprout. (They should hurry up already!)

Happy planting!

a look back on february

Last time this year I was up to my eyeballs in stress getting ready for our upcoming wedding...and moving...and getting my ESL endorsement, so I am happy to report that this year's February was quite uneventful! Don and I both submitted applications for graduate/law school programs and applied for scholarships. Collectively, I think we have written about 15 650,000 essays this month. We are keeping our fingers crossed (and stalking the mail man) while we wait to hear back! We can say that no matter what, we will be in Utah for at least two years! 

Valentine's was nice and relaxed this year. Because our anniversary is in March, we opted to go smaller for Valentine's Day and bigger for our anniversary. We enjoyed candlelight Chipotle (we may or may not be a little obsessed with Chipotle). Don gave me the cutest black and white polka dot pencil skirt (oh how I love polka dots) and I gave him some new dress pants. Aren't we romantic? :) Don was sly and had a dozen roses delivered to work, that was romantic! Plus my kids were totally intrigued. 

In addition with being obsessed with Chipotle, we are slightly (which means alot) obsessed with Granite Bakery...especially their sugar cookies. I gave them to my class this year as a little valentine treat (they must be introduced to the finer things of life, such as Granite Bakery, at a young age). We got a dozen cookies for ourselves and they may or may not have been finished off by the end of the weekend...

We did attempt to make our own homemade Granite bakery cookies...not as good. You can't repeat the real thing. But they turned out cute and we had fun doing it!

Our attempt at homemade Granite Bakery cookies. Just not the same!

Candlelight Dinner of Chipotle.

With March well under way, we are looking forward to....

• Our 1st wedding anniversary
• Don's spring break
• Warmer weather
• Green Great Harvest bread for St. Patrick's Day (seriously)
• And some fun and exciting changes to be announced later....(no, not a baby)

Our First Valentines Day (Married)!

To start off, Jen is the head poster on this blog, so forgive me(Don) if this post is strange in any way. Hopefully beginners luck will hold out...

We had to switch up our laptops for the past few days so Jen signed on and forgot to sign out... making this the opportune moment to hack in and share a few of my thoughts!

Tomorrow is Valentines Day- our first as a married couple! Last year, a leadership conference took me to California for the weekend and I was unable to be with my amazing Fiance (at the time). This year though, I am home to stay and can't believe the history we are making as we continue forward in our eternal marriage!

For all that know Jen, and I assume that is each person who reads this blog, there is nothing negative that can be uttered about her. Jen is the love of my life and will be forever and ever! I love waking up to her each morning, kissing her goodbye as we part for the day, texting silly messages back and forth, seeing her for the first time in 10 hours (usually- when she picks me up from the U), making and eating dinner together, doing the dishes together(since we have no dishwasher), being lazy when we have a few minutes to do so, attending church together, walking around the Village and so so many more things. I have been blessed with her sweet and gentile spirit, her kind and caring attitude, her gorgeous and refreshing smile and her beautiful loving eyes. From my perspective, I am truly the luckiest man alive. Each day is a new adventure, every moment together- a time of Joy and I love every second of it.

Before Jen and I started dating, I never knew this depth of love was possible- now I know it is!

I love you my Amazing, Beautiful, Kind, Supportive, Generous, Spiritual, Loving, Understanding (and so much more) Wife. You keep me going and motivate me to become a better man.

You are simply the best, and always will be. Happy First Valentines Together :)

Much Love,

The Hubbster

bless their hearts

My kids are always giving me notes and pictures and jewelry and other cute stuff. This one managed to make its way to our fridge. Good motivator!

some favorites

You know you are old when you can only get through about 5 pages of a book before falling asleep. Let's be honest, after spending a day with the 3rd graders, I am lucky if I can make it through about 3 pages before sawing logs. In spite of this, the last few months I have read a few really good books--if you're looking for a good book to read, I recommend these!

 

a look back at winter vacation...

As per tradition of posting on our blog on only a semi-annual (at best) basis, here's a look back at our winter vacation.

We had an awesome two weeks eating, sleeping, shopping, traveling, new-car-buying, baking, eating out, playing, watching movies and house sitting. Here's a look back at what we did on our two weeks from school/work...

I kicked off the winter break a few hours early by watching the original How the Grinch Stole Christmas at school with my kids. Alot of them had no idea that there was an old version, and I had no idea it was only 23 minutes long! (I swear it was way longer than). We may or may not have eaten alot of candy canes that day too.

Here's a few highlights from our break.

We ate an **amazing** traditional seafood dinner at the Willie's house to celebrate with Don's dad before he headed to visit family.

I have been wanting a Kindle for quite sometime and Don being the adorable husband he is, surprised me with one. So sly!! (Don't mind the nastiness/pastiness of this picture, yuck).

Christmas eve we decided to sleep in the living room...just because we were being festive (my family judged us when we told them that). Don is trying out his new razor.

Dawson was festive for the occasion. (Note: I had to take this picture like 265 times before he would hold still, there may have been a bribery of treats involved).

With my family Christmas day.

Christmas night we headed to Temple Square to look at the lights. We even found the Cambodian bag.

Don's sister, Lauren, and mom came with us to brave the cold!

First married Christmas

(Don't mind that this is out of order). In the days leading up to Christmas we did a TON of baking. (I don't know what I was thinking). Here are some gingebread cookies that we made.

Snuggie gingerbread man

Cyclops gingebread man

Abominable snowman gingerbread man and Colonial gingerbread man

Don surprised me with dinner and tickets to the Nutcracker

I am SO SO SO lucky he knows how to cook (he may or may not have had to teach me when we got married...)

The food was amazing!!!

Off to see the Nutcracker! 

For a few months we have been looking for a new car. One day, while running errands, we decided to stop by the subaru dealership just to browse...and then before we knew it, we had traded in our cute little red Ford Focus (I cried a little inside) and drove away with our Subaru Impreza. We are LOVING it. An added bonus is that I don't feel like my life is in danger when driving to work before the plows have come on days it has snowed. Go, Subaru!!

For our wedding, one of our friends that I work with gave us a weekend in Vegas. So we decided to leave the cold and go enjoy some sunshine.

This Statue of Liberty is made from Jelly Belly's. Pretty impressive.

The best show in Las Vegas, one without people, just fire. 

 Hope you all had an enjoyable break and a happy new year!