5 years

5 years ago today my life changed FOREVER! 5 years ago was our first date. From that moment on my life was never the same. I think back on that night and can't believe how my life changed because Jared asked me out on a date. I thought I would share a post I did on this date from a blog I had. It makes me laugh to read this now.  I really hadn't dated that much, and was still VL at that time. (Yep I was 22 and never been kissed, and had only been out on a dozen or so dates in my entire life.) Have a read...

"I actually had a date with a guy that I actually like. The last time that happened was... either April or May. I could tell I was a little nervous because my heart was racing and my hands were shaking, hasnt happened in some time.

Jared (my date) came and picked me up at 5:50, we then went to Walmart to ring the bell for the Salvation Army with other people from our ward. Sang Christmas Carols and froze our butts off. It was FREEZING! Honestly didn't feel like I was on a date during this time.

We went to Panda Express to get something to eat before going to The Forgotten Carols at the institute. I guess I just cant take silence, because I kept asking him questions while we were eating. Found out more about him and his family.

We were then off to the institute. The forgotten carols was amazing. He had his arm around me during the entire thing, not to mention held my hand. I certainly didnt mind... :)

We then came back to my apartment to have some hot chocolate. My roommates were watching "He's Just Not That Into You" and we drank hot chocolate. We watched the movie with my roommates until they decided to leave, I hope it was just because they were tired and not because I was there with him.

Once that movie was over I told him our options were that he either goes home or putting in another movie. We then watched "The Muppet Christmas Carol" one of my favorite Christmas movies. We all know what it means when you watch a movie... So I wont get into the details here. I will say this much, it sure was nice... yeah... :)

It was a fun night!"

Anyway now that we have all had a laugh at my 22 year old self... I still remember that night like it was yesterday. I am SO grateful that Jared had the courage to call me up and ask me out on a date. I then found my best friend, my partner in life through everything, a man who loves me more than anything, and the love of my life. 

Here we are 5 years later, more mature (obviously lol) and living a fantastic life together. I am looking forward to more years with this wonderful man who brings SO much to my life.

Puppy Love

At the beginning of November we took in a res/stray dog, who has taken on the name "Sweetie" here in MC that was PREGNANT. On November 4th I was able to witness Sweetie give birth to 8 puppies all on her own without any assistance from me. It was a wonderful experience, one that I won't forget.
As of today these little ones are 3 weeks old! The time has gone fast in some ways. It has been so fun to see them grow over the weeks. We most likely won't be keeping any of them (I REALLY want to though), so we are taking names of people interested in these guys. There are 3 boys and 5 girls. I am already getting attached to some of them, and it kills me to think I am going to be saying goodbye to them in just over a month. Here are a bunch of pictures we took this last Saturday.

 All puppies together!

 

 This is a girl, who we have nicknamed "Soxy"

 This is a girl, we just call her "White Girl" simply because she is all white.

 This is a boy, we've nicknamed him "Mister"

 Another boy, who we nicknamed "Six" because he has six toes on his back feet.

 A girl, she was the smallest for a while so she is known as "Little Girl" and is my favorite of the girls.

 Another girl, we call her "Stripes" because of the white stripe on her face, though she has white on her chest too.

 Boy who we call "Buddy" is my FAVORITE boy/puppy.

 Girl, we call her "Big Girl" she is the biggest girl and is quite the chunk.

 This is momma "Sweetie", honestly one of the sweetest dogs I've met.

 Bo is a little obsessed with these guys, but his motherly instincts have come out. He even tries to play with them. It's quite cute, and has made me feel better about how he will be if we have a baby.

Jared & I with all 8 puppies. We are in love with them.

We are not looking forward to saying goodbye to them, but want them to have wonderful loving homes. We just want someone to love them as much as we do. And the more I hold them, the more I realize that I desperately want to be a mother.

Tie to Friends

So I had this line pop into my head today. And for the life of me I could NOT think of where I had heard it. Once I realized where it was from I did the whole hit forehead/duh thing because FRIENDS is my absolute FAVORITE TV show. It's from "The One With The Birth Mother" an episode I haven't watched in a very long time, though now I think I have to watch the whole 10th season. Anyway I found this photo/meme of the 1 line...

This pretty well sums it up. We're parent's without a child.

Halloween 2014

This year for Halloween the 3 of us were pirates. We of course decked out the house in all my cute Halloween Decor and did our best with the outside. I missed having a yard and leaves to rake up to put in decorative bags, so the outside wasn't as spectacular as it was in our last home.

(Bo absolutely HATES this decoration and barks at it)

 

Our branch had a  Trunk-or-Treat and of course we decked out the trunk to look like a pirate's cave with a skeleton and a treasure box with coins. We had a fun time passing out candy to the kids in our branch that night and enjoyed the chili cook off as well.

 (You can't tell but Bo's pirate costume was just a bandana with skulls on it, he sure was cute)

Halloween night we put the finishing touches on the outside decor and got ready for our trick-or-treaters. A tradition of ours (well mine really) was to get a jack-o-lantern pizza from Papa Murphy's for dinner, but seeing as there is not one anywhere close we had to improvise. We made our own and it was DELICIOUS! We ended up running out of candy that night and had to turn some of the kids away. We haven't had a ton of trick-or-treaters before this year, it was really fun to see all the kids dressed up. That night Jared helped with the school's Halloween Dance. I went over for the last hour to dance with my husband. I think we ended up dancing more than the kids. It was pretty fun.

 I LOVE this pirate!

 (Halloween Night Bo wore this costume instead of his pirate one, cute huh)

 Our Family

Our Jack-o-Lantern Pizza

We hope you all had a "spooktacular" Halloween!

Update

So it's been a few months since I updated here so I better do it I guess.
We're loving our new life here in MC (Montezuma Creek). We've done a little exploring of our little corner of the world. We have gone to 3 National Parks together since we moved here. We went to Mesa Verde in Colorado back in September and went to Arches and Canyonlands this last weekend. We certainly live in a beautiful place. We've both recieved callings in our little branch here. Jared is a facilitator for the 12 Step group and I am teaching Seminary (early morning, though it starts @ 7:15 which is not that early really). Jared is teaching 7 music classes at Whitehorse, and they just had their fall concert last week. We've made LOTS of friends here and have a very active social life here. Bo has become more use to people and only growls at people when they first come in our home, which is a HUGE improvement. Bo loves to play out in the practice field as often as we will let him, and he is getting use to having to be on a leash when we go out. I'm now working 30 hours a week fairly consistently with my job with ATA Services, but am hoping they will get a 3rd person to help with approvals. I recently became a consultant with Jamberry, and am looking forward to the opportunities it will bring me.
Any of you who read my personal blog have learned that we have decided to put trying to have a baby on hold temporarily. I have become regular again which we are both very grateful for, but things still have not happened for us. It has become too difficult for me emotionally. Also this will give me a chance to focus on my own health and get myself back on track to where I need to be physically, emotionally, and spiritually. It has been an EXTREMELY difficult decision to make, but we know this is what we need to be doing right now. We are hoping that after the holidays are over we can look into getting the medical help we need in order for us to become parents. We both appreciate all your support, concern, and prayers as we have struggled for the past year and 4 months.

So we went to the doctor last week. Mostly it was to get an idea of where to go from here now that I need to find a doctor that isn't 6 hours away. After giving him information on the last few months, he really didn't have any directions for me to take. I had a normal (actually short) cycle when not on Clomiph, so he really didn't know what to tell me because for all we know my body has FINALLY figured out what it's supposed to be doing. The only real direction he could give me is to go to a competent doctor, one who is an OB GYN. So I guess that was helpful. But he said to see how this cycles go and give him a call and I am sure he will have more helpful information.
I really just want to throw in the towel on this whole trying to get pregnant thing. But I don't want to give up on my own health. Things should be right with me, and Jared agrees on that at least.
This next bit may make me sound... to put it nicely rude.. but it needs to be said. My dear readers/friends/family please don't ask how things are going with having a baby. Please don't ask if I am pregnant yet. Don't ask why we haven't done more to have a baby. And PLEASE don't tell me to relax and have faith. It really isn't helpful. And trust me when I am pregnant or we have more information on whether or not we can even get pregnant I WILL let you know. Thanks for all your support and concern.

For all those trying to get your own little miracle... PLEASE DO NOT be afraid to let me know. Just because mine hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean I won't be TOTALLY thrilled for you. Don't feel that you have to hide the most exciting news you've ever had.

We've got a Job!!!

We received a job offer over the weekend. We did some evaluating as well as fasting and prayer. And... WE'VE ACCEPTED!!!

It's a full time teaching job at Whitehorse High in the San Juan County School District. Jared will be teaching Music (various classes that he's able to decide on) and most likely 1 drama class(his choice this time). Whitehorse is located in Montezuma Creek, which is about 40 minutes from Blanding, Utah. It's on the Navajo Indian Reservation, which means most of the students are Navajo. It'll be a little of a culture shock that's for sure. (Some of the signs in the school are in English AND the Navajo language).

There is teacher housing available right behind the school (yes we will basically be living at the school lol). They generally only take pets smaller than our Bo, but they said they'd make an exception (guessing because we said that Bo is part of our family and we wouldn't take the job if he wasn't allowed). That was our biggest concern after reading the housing policy, so hearing that all 3 of us can live there was a HUGE relief. Housing there is VERY cheap. A 3 bedroom with Bo would cost a little bit more than what we paid for our first apartment in Cedar (the TINY 1 bedroom with barely a kitchen). They are like a duplex all on 1 level, which is awesome (though sharing a wall with someone else again is going to take some getting use to). Because the housing is owned by the district, our rent and everything will just come out of his monthly salary (well at least once school starts and his contract actually starts). I can access my work's website through the school's internet (YAY!), but we will probably come up with a back up option as well. From what we heard from fellow teachers we met on Saturday the utility bills aren't too bad, except for propane (I wasn't surprised about that though, propane is pretty expensive).

It doesn't snow there really, and it gets fairly hot in the summer. It looked and felt a little like Ridgecrest while we were there on Saturday actually. There is lots of hiking and things close to where we will be, not to mention all the national parks in that area.

So instead of moving in with my parent's in 2 weeks, we'll be moving to Montezuma Creek (that is if they have a unit available by then). It means only moving once and having the entire summer to get use to the area and the culture.

I am still really nervous about this move (it is a big move). It'll put us further away from our family (though I will be closer to my sister but it's still a 6 hour drive there). It's REALLY out in the middle of nowhere (we would be driving an hour to go grocery shopping - the place we hear is best to go to is actually in Colorado).

But we'll still have our Bo, I can keep my job, and we'll have each other no matter how this all pans out.

We're Moving

Wayne County School District decided to not renew Jared's teaching contract for the next school year. Reasons unknown as to why, but it came as quite a shock to all of us. We've known since end of March, but wanted to keep it hush hush for a while. But now that we are moving in less than a month, well there is no sense in keeping it quiet. We don't have another teaching job yet, so we have no idea where we will be going next. But my parents have been kind enough to let us live with them AGAIN. This time around we will have to get a storage unit for all our things because there is no where for them at my parents. Everything (minus our clothing) we own has to get boxed up so it can be in storage for a few months. We've accumulated enough stuff that we actually need to rent a trailer to get everything moved because 1 horse trailer wont do it anymore.
I am starting to feel overwhelmed. I don't know how I am going to get this place all packed up and the house cleaned before Memorial Day and still work (2 more clients have been added for next month) and get another doctors appointment in before the move (yes I am still NOT pregnant or regular). Oh and I am not going to be able to start on the packing and cleaning until next week because I am headed to Women's Conference with my mom-in-law tomorrow. (So not ready to go out of town tomorrow - HUNDREDS of approvals to do still, though I am way excited.)
Not sure how things will work out, but I know they will... somehow.

3 Years

I can't believe it's been 3 years already. Some days it feels like it was just yesterday. Then again it seems like we've always been married. We've been through a lot these past 3 years. School, being poor, thoughts of divorce, Graduation, living with my parents, living in our first home, getting our first dog together, struggling to have a child, and many more. BUT I would do it all over again. Because though things were ridiculously hard, Jared and I have become closer. Becoming Mrs Marisa Wonnacott was the best decision I ever made. Looking forward to the many years ahead and seeing where this life will lead us. I love you Jared.