Changes are coming

Well there are going to be some changes coming our way. Jared put in his application for student teaching on Friday. He put in to student teach at Bingham High School, which is the high school me and my siblings all graduated from. We found out that we wont get official word until mid November (yuck), that is if Jared doesn't go ahead and call the principal & band teacher (although he is planning on calling them anyway). So... I called my mom and gave her the official word that we are going to move in with them. Yay. So now that we know kind of what is going on, we can start making preparations to finally move out of Cedar. Thankfully my parents have an 8 stall barn, so we will have a stall to store all our furniture and other possessions until we move again. So there is work to do out in the barn, as well as work my parents want to do on the house. The 2 bedrooms upstairs at my parent's still have the original paint/wallpaper and carpet that was there when we moved in 19 years ago. SO it's an excuse to do some upgrading in the house. And of course this move will be different than any other move we have made, because most of our stuff will be in storage. So packing is going to be a little more complicated because everything will need to be packed really carefully. Yes the move wont be until the end of December, but there is still lots that can be done. Other changes include me losing weight. I know I keep bring up my weight loss over and over between this blog and my personal blog, but it really is a goal I have. Recently I have had pictures taken of me by professionals, and it has really made me want to get rid of some weight. So hopefully some changes in this department. I am sure there will be some other changes coming our way, but I honestly am drawing a blank.

Latest

Just thought I would just give a little update on us and what's new. Well... Kaitlin moved out into her own apartment where she lives with a few other girls. She is actually living in the same complex that both Jared and I lived in when we met, and where I lived during my college years. Seems like she is liking being around people in the same stage of life she is. School started last week. Jared is in 3 performing classes this semester (band, orchestra, and jazz band) and a few other classes totaling 12 credits this semester. This semester is the last semester of course work for Jared, and the last semester we have to buy textbooks. YAY! Jared got a job a week or 2 ago working as a nanny. He watches 2 little boys (ages 2 and 6 months). He works 7-11 3 days a week. He is still working with the convocations as well. I am still working at Maverik. I am on a rotation schedule with 2 other women I work with. On this rotation I end up work many days in a row (which stinks), but every 3 weeks I get a Saturday & Sunday off. With Jared's schedule this semester it will be nice to get a weekend together every 3 weeks. The other nice thing is that I only have to work every 3rd Sunday. We will be going on a 10 day vacation with my family right after finals are over. We will be going to Orlando Florida to go to DisneyWorld and Universal Studios Orlando. My dad figured this would really be the only chance for all of us to go there together, because eventually Jared and I will have kids and Jared will be working in his career as a Band Teacher. Anyway, we are so very excited to to go on a real vacation. We haven't really gone on a vacation since our honeymoon. Every other trip we have taken has been to visit family, or we have gone camping. We can't wait. Jared submitted his application for student teaching recently, so we just have to wait and see if the school he put down will accept him. We are hoping to student teach up in the Salt Lake area, simply because music is a bigger deal and there will be more job opportunities for both of us up north. So... we are going to be moving out of Cedar City just after our vacation. We will most likely be moving in with my parents during student teaching. It's not something we really want to do, but know it will be a huge benefit to us. We will be able to save money during that time, which will help in paying off the loan Jared has and getting a nice down payment on a new place for us. All of this is still up in the air until we know where Jared is student teaching. Well... I think that is what's happening with us. Just keep plugging along, working hard and all that good stuff.

And then there were 3

We have another person in our family now, and NO I am NOT expecting or are we getting a dog. But there are 3 of us living in our home. My sister Kaitlin is now living in our second bedroom for a month and a half. She will be going to SUU in the fall and decided to live here in Cedar with us while she looks for a job. She's only been here about a week, but we like having her here. I hope to grow closer to my sister as she lives here in Cedar City. We don't plan on expanding our family for a while. We think and talk about having a baby, but don't feel it is quite the time. But we are enjoying being married, and are just living life.

Our New Home

On the first of this month, we moved out of our tiny 1 bedroom apartment into a 2 bedroom place. YAY!!! Well it took some time, but we finally got settled in and got our home all decorated. So to all of those out there that want to get a peak at our new home here you go:

Here is our lovely home!

Our 2nd bedroom is currently our office/storage room.

Our living room is almost twice as big as our old one. 

We can actually fit and use all our furniture now! And even invite people over because there will actually be a place for everyone to sit.

It feels more like home here, now that we don't have to try and cram all our wall decor onto 2 walls!

We actually have a kitchen! Our old place our kitchen doubled as the hallway to our bedroom. Now I have so much counter space not to mention all the cupboards and pantry we have now!

Oh and we can actually put our table in the kitchen, where it belongs!

Our bedroom seems to have so much more space. It is definitely less crowded than it was before.

The sink is actually in the bathroom here rather than in the bedroom. The only drawbacks are that there isn't a door to the bathroom, and we don't have a bath-tub now.





We are loving our new home and all the space that has come with it. We wont be here terribly long though, just through December.  Most of our ward lives in this complex, so we know a lot of our neighbors already.
We live close to one of the parks here in town, and have already walked there and back once. It's definitely a nicer neighborhood than where we used to live, and I feel more safe here. It's not terribly close to campus or work, but it's still less than 5 minutes to drive.
This new place is a great blessing to us, as it is scholarship housing which means 75% of our rent is paid by the school (our rent is only $115 a month now!).
We are very happy here! Hope you enjoyed our picture tour.

FORT TIME!!!

So back in April sometime, we saw that we had so many boxes laying around from us starting to pack up our things before the move. And what do you do with lots of boxes??? Well... you build an epic fort of course. So that is just what we did! It ended up taking up our entire little living room.  And here is how it turned out...

It ended up involving our entertainment center with our T.V.

Jared enjoying all the space (well more than you'd expect)

This was our date for that week. We ended up having a ton of fun. We blew up our queen sized air mattress and stuck it inside. We actually slept in it for a few nights and watch movies together. It was a blast! We really didn't want to take it down, but it did take our whole living room, so we kinda had to. We'll have to do it again sometime!

Anniversary Trip

Well it's about time I posted on this... So for our 1st Anniversary this year we spent the weekend in Vegas. I had never been to Vegas before this trip. We decided we would see the sights (aka the strip) and spend some time at the Las Vegas Temple. On our way down we saw our lives pass before our eyes... let me explain. As we were driving down I-15 we were cruising at 80 miles an hour and all of the sudden the cars in front of us were at a dead stop. So basically we had to go from 80 miles an hour to a stop in less than 500 feet and it wasn't going to happen. Luckily we were in the right lane and had a dirt median that we could vear off into. We nearly clipped the car in front of us as we went off into the median, but made it out safely. We got back up onto the freeway, and there was no damage to our car. Turned out there was an accident not too far ahead on the freeway and that's why things were at a stop. Eventually we made it to our hotel, and we started our weekend. Here are pictures of our adventures...




















While we were in Vegas we saw my 3 little cousins who live there with there mom who I am very close with. It was so good to see those boys, and they love when Jared is with me too. They think he's so cool and fun.

We had a lot of fun.

Our First Valentines Day

So we just had a first Valentines Day together as a married couple. We've had 1 together as a dating couple, and 1 as an engaged couple both of which were wonderful. But this year was different. I unfortunately had to work on Valentines Day, but we were able to get some one on one time together. I made Jared's gift this year, it was a book made from playing cards that was titled "52 Reasons Why I Love You." This took me some time to put together, but I think he really loved it. Along with the book I got him new sunglasses, a cute little stuffed bear, and gummies (Jared absolutely loves gummy stuff). Jared woke up with me at 4:30, and went down to scrape my car windows for me which is not something he does for me. He also came by before he went to school and put a CD in my car that I would listen to when I got off. Totally surprised me. It started with our song "Then" by Brad Paisley, followed by music he knew I wanted and songs that make him think of me. So cute! He also sent me a single red rose which arrived after I got home from work. He also made us a calendar with pictures we have taken since we got together with all the birthdays and other important events of the year on it.
That day Jared got a dent in the slide in his trombone, so he skipped 2 classes so we could get it repaired ASAP. He had concerts and other performances so it needed to be repaired quickly. So we drove to St George and dropped the trombone off to be repaired. While we waited we went to the visitors center at the St George Temple and walked around the temple grounds. We would have done a session or something, but the temple is closed for maintenance and what not. It was nice to just hold hands and be near the temple, where we had thought about getting married at one point. It was also nice to listen to music and hold hands in the car on the way down.
When we got home, we put the lasagna in the oven and ran to the grocery store to get some garlic bread. We ate dinner and watched "Friends with Benefits" and went off to bed.
It was just so nice to spend time together and show our love to one another. It was a great Valentines Day.
Our 1 Year Anniversary is in a few weeks so we'll have another excuse to show how much we love each other all over again.