Love Note to a Stranger

Yesterday was Valentine's day and I thought it might be nice to text my family and tell them I love them. So I typed up the following silly little note (silly, because who takes Valentine's day seriously except 15 year old girls?)

"I lovers you! Happy v day! I hope you get a big smooch from someone nice."

I was quite shocked when, almost immediately, my brother in law responded with "S#@*," then, "who is this?"

I wrote back "Lisa" but in my mind I was all like, "This is the last time I try to send a nice sentiment. Whatever!"

I was expecting an "lol" and a "happy v day to you too lisa" But no. Silence on his end. Then it dawned on me that my brother- and sister-in-law recently moved and probably changed their cell phone numbers. Oh my gosh! So Embarrassing! So I texted back really quick "sorry wrong number."

My text message stranger resplied: "I was gonna say I have no idea who you are, but after a text like that I should get to know you."

Ryan and I had a good chuckle and then I secretly started praying this is my dumbest blonde moment of the year.

Snowpocalypse 2012

Oh, what do you do on a snowy day, when all the world is white?

Do you work on GenTax?

Or, build a fort to relax...

... And watch some Tinkerbell?

Do you play a board game?

Or, first place claim, in a obstacle course contest?

Do you get your craft on, with some scissors and glue?

Or, go out in the snow and hope your lips don't turn blue?

Do you paint the snow red?

Or, take a ride in a laundry basket sled?

Do you throw snow in Dad's face?

Or, just lay still in one place and watch the snow flakes fall?

Do you make pizza for dinner?

Or, talk about winter, and how it will never be over??????

Is that what you do?

So, do we!


15 inches in our drive.

Elder Johnson Revisits The Lonestar State

Ryan served his mission in the McAllen, Texas mission. He has always talked about going back some day and after his stories of gangsters and dogs and front porch bbqs and tortillas, I really wanted to see it too.

Every year Ryan's work has a big meeting for all of it's employees and they bring along spouses and families just for the fun of it. This year the meeting was in San Antonio, Texas. Being so close, we just couldn't pass up the opportunity to stay a little longer and revisit some of Ryan's old mission areas.

We started the week at the JW Marriott for Ryan's work meetings. This hotel features six acres of heated pools, fountains, waterfalls and rivers so you can imagine what Sadie and I were doing while Ryan was meeting-ing it up.

Ryan & I at the Formal Dinner

When the work shindig was over we visited the Alamo and the Riverwalk and then headed South to the border. Our first stop was Laredo, TX. 



At The Alamo



All of Ryan's mission journals and contacts are packed away in a storage unit in Utah so he didn't really have anyway of finding the people he would have liked to have visited. But because of the transitory nature of border towns and immigrants, it was highly unlikely he would have been able to find these people even if he did have any contact info. So, we didn't get to visit with anybody Ryan taught. But we did get to drive by his mission apartments and drive by the houses of some people he taught. As we were driving by he would tell us stories.

In Laredo we got to see the house of a woman he taught and baptized. She worked as a live-in housekeeper for a family and was trying to save money to bring the rest of her family from Mexico.

Next we went to Brownsville, stopping in Harlingen and San Benito on the way. In Harlingen we saw the apartment where Ryan co-habitated with a porcupine. This porcupine just happened to be a thief and stole his Christmas presents. 

Trying a Mexican Sucker. This one is flavored with Chili Powder.

In Brownsville Ryan served in Cameron Park, which at the time was the poorest neighborhood in the entire United States. Ryan's best mission stories hail from Cameron Park. There are too many good ones to relay here, but if you want to know just ask Ryan about the dogs, the gangsters and the mayo-covered corn.

We took a few days leave of absence from the mission trail and visited South Padre Island. We spent most of the time on the beach.

Our Little Beach Baby

While we were in South Padre Island we went on a dolphin watching tour which was AMAZING! We found a pod of dolphins within just a few minutes of being out on the water. The dolphins were swimming so close to our boat we probably could have touched them if we tried. Our tour guide was also really knowledgeable. He was able to point out the baby dolphins, who, he said, still had their birth wrinkles, making them no more than a few days old.

Dolphins. Coincidentally, they are hard to photograph.

We headed back up to San Antonio and spent our last day down on the Riverwalk. We had lunch on the Riverwalk with some overly friendly birds. There was a duck that kept biting my leg because he wanted food. Sadie still talks about the mean birds in Texas. We also took a little boat ride down the river and saw the sites. San Antonio is a very beautiful city architecturally. I loved it!

This was a fabulous family vacation. I couldn't have wished for a better time!



Gettin' The Crazy Out

With Bambino dos on the way, Ryan's 30th birthday last month and our Anniversary next month, Ryan and I decided we deserved a kid-free vacation. A little time to sleep in, relax and enjoy some tantrum/potty training/ food cutting- free time together. We didn't want to spend a lot of money, but we definitely wanted to go somewhere warm. Another requirement was that we wanted to see something we had never seen before. Our final destination? Phoenix, AZ (warm and cheap...er) with a little road trip to the Grand Canyon (something great we had never seen before. It is, after all, one of the new seven wonders of the world according to wikipdeia and USA Today).

Some how I convinced the grand-parental people to fly in and play with the Sadester for a week while we journeyed westward. (THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!) I was not worried in the least bit. On Monday morning, our day of departure, I told Sadie we were leaving and she said, "Ok, mom. Bye! See you soon."

Sweet! And we were off!

We spent 3 days in Scottsdale dining, pool-side lounging, and movie going. I think we may have been the youngest people inhabiting that town by at least 30 years. I guess it is true that you get wiser with age because it seems like a pretty good life to me.

Somewhere around day 2 1/2 I declared to Ryan, "I don't feel crazy any more!" which I guess he either understood or agreed with because all I got in response was a smile. One does get that way after a certain number of times viewing Dora the Explorer, you know. Luckily the remedy is a little more sleep than usual, a lot more sunshine than usual and remembering some past times that I almost forgot I enjoyed: reading, biking, spending time with the hottest guy ever...

A break for some pics:

So, after 3 great days of sunshine we road tripped it to the Grand Canyon.
Miles driven: about 250 (about a 4 hour drive)
Average rating of all the restaurants in town: 1. Trip Advisor suggests McDonald's as the best place to eat.
Color of our hotel: Pink. Never trust a pink hotel...
Weather conditions upon awakening the next morning: blizzard
Grand Canyon entrance fee: $25
Forest Ranger response when asked about the viewing conditions: "Very little..."
Our spectacular views of the Grand Canyon:

It was FREEZING!!!! Oh, and completely fogged in. None was the exact amount we saw of the Grand Canyon. We had a good laugh, went and saw the IMAX film to figure out what we had missed and then we high tailed it back to the land of old people and sunshine.

Loved the vacation. Loved the sleep. Loved the company. I even loved the Grand Canyon.
Loved coming home. Sadie smiled ear to ear for about 15 minutes straight when we got home. I am glad to know she missed us just a little bit.

So, I feel like I got all my crazy out... just in time for it to start all over again. Bring on the toddler, bring on the baby, bring on the Dora. I (think) I can handle it now.

Time to Explore

We decided that since we are going to be in Denver for such a short time, we would spend the weekends doing as much exploring as we could.

Today we took Sadie to the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. It was so much fun. She spent the entire time starring in awe and then running to the next exhibit.

My favorite was in the animal exhibit she would say "shhh, listen" and try to hear the animals.

Great Saturday afternoon.

I also ventured out for my first run in Colorado. We have a trail that runs right by our house so I was excited to try it out. I haven't had time or been brave enough to take Malley out yet and decided it would be good to get him out for some exercise and to learn his new surrounds.

Stupid mistake! The dumb dog started limping again after only 1 mile (if you want to read a similar story into how good my dog is at faking injury click here) Of course, once we got home he was running around the backyard like a maniac. I guess he just doesn't like running on a leash...or something...I don't know. I do know for sure that my next run will be dog free.

In other exploring news, I have come to discover that driving in Denver is a much more time consuming activity than it was in Utah.

Before I leave the house I have to do a google map search and write down every direction to make sure that I can get to where I am going and then home again. Then, of course, there are the 10 times I have to turn around because

• I turned on the wrong Jamison Street (I have seen about 10 different Jamison Streets in Littleton alone.) Last week in church I was so excited to meet one of my neighbors who also lived on Jamison. Come to find out she lived on the other Jamison that is 2 blocks away ... Seriously, whoever names the streets in Colorado has very little imagination because they name them the same names over and over again. The other day when I was looking for the Library I came to the cross section of Easter Street and Easter Street... It is a problem.
• I missed the street I was supposed to turn on or I took the right exit off the freeway, but headed in the wrong direction.
• The google map was wrong and now I am stuck in the parking lot of a Starbucks and not at the library like I intended. So, I have to call Ryan and have him do a different map search and give me the actual directions.
• or, all of the above.

Yes, I think a GPS will be on my Christmas list.

However, I was so awesomely surprised when I was driving on the freeway the other day. I needed to get over to exit and I put on my blinker. People actually let me in!!!

You cannot understand my excitement if you have never driven in Utah before. But all you Utahans, you know what I mean. You put your blinker on in Utah and the drivers next to you either

• ignore you and go the exact same speed, so you have to drastically slow down and hinder traffic in your lane (I once witnessed a lady at a dead stop on the freeway with her blinker on trying to get over to the exit) or you have to step on the gas and cut the guy off, which inevitably makes them mad so they tail you for the next mile,
• or they purposely speed up and glare at you, because heaven forbid a car gets in front of them!

Yes, I may be pitifully lost, but at least the drivers around me are polite.

Yeah, so that's our activities in Denver so far. 1 week down. 49 to go :)

Did I Mention...

that we are moving?

It is consuming my every waking hour. And those hours are many because the stress of trying to get out and get the house ready to sell in minus 2 weeks and counting is causing sleep depriving anxiety attacks. AAHHH!

Ryan's work is going to get us a place in Denver for the 6 months or so that we will be there, but they haven't told us where yet. The stress of not knowing where I am going to be living in 2 weeks is probably going to kill me. Although, I do know that we have been approved for a house instead of an apartment so that is a HUGE sigh of relief. I was not looking forward to spending the winter trapped in an apartment with a dog and a toddler. One of us would not have survived. I am sure of it.

Anyway, in anxiety and anticipation for finding out where we are going to be living I did a little research of my own and found the most perfect house for us. It has 4 bedrooms so there would be plenty of space for people to come and visit. It has a dog run on the side of the house for Malley. And a big fenced backyard that Sadie can play in and I can be worry free. It even is fully furnished so we wouldn't have to worry about moving all of our stuff (which is currently planned to go into storage). There is a gym 6 minutes away so I can get a little me time. And it is only a 15 minute commute to Ryan's work. It is perfect!

Now we are just waiting to see if Ryan's company will approve it, or if we are going to have to stay in a house of their choosing. If you love me at all, please pray we are approved for this house!!!

Endure to the End

It sounds easy, but don't let that step fool you. It is harder than it sounds.

A few weeks ago I heard a story about a man, who in his 80th year of life decided to have an affair with an old (and when I say old, I mean old!) girl friend and eventually decided to leave his wife of 50+ years. Shortly after leaving, his (ex)wife was diagnosed with cancer. She died a mere 3 weeks later. It begs the questions, "Couldn't he have waited a few more weeks?"

That's the question I asked myself this afternoon as I turned on my kitchen faucet and watched water flood into my cabinets while not a drop came out of the faucet. 3 weeks. My house only needs to stay intact for 3 more weeks.

We have been expecting to get a transfer notice from Ryan's job any day for the past 2 years. But it didn't come and it didn't come. But our house held out great! ...until about 6 months ago.

In the past 6 months we have:

replaced the motor on the garage door, replaced the springs and rebalanced the door: $700
installed a new furnace: $5,000
replaced the coolant in the air conditioner: $400
cleaned the air vents: $200
built a square foot garden: $200

Well, the transfer notice came. So, as we put our house up for sale and prepare to move to Denver in 3 weeks, you can add $188 (plus whatever it will cost to get it installed) to the list of repairs we have made on our house that we will not be around to enjoy.

Can you endure to the end? If you are my house, then the answer is NO!

(On the plus side, if you are in the market for a house. Come and check out ours! You can be confident nothing will break for a long, long time. We have replaced it all!)

Tru Wuv & Merwage

Ryan and I passed our 6th year of marriage this last May 7th. I choose the word "passed" instead of celebrated because it kinda got buried amidst our mad rush to get to Florida on the 8th. (Surprising how co-workers and anniversaries don't mesh very well.)

I honestly don't remember what we did to celebrate, except for the fact that we spent way too much money on each other's gifts.

I had been scouring the classifieds for a patio set and I was getting extremely irritated that Ryan was not enthusiastic about any of the sets I found and was always coming up with an excuse for why a particular set wouldn't work. It never even crossed my mind that he might be getting me a new patio set for our anniversary. It finally made sense when I opened my present. I HEART my patio set. I love summer evenings!If you have noticed that Ryan has been looking especially cool these last few months it is because I got him an awesome new pair of sunglasses. They even have his prescription in the lenses. If I do say so myself, he looks pretty hot.

So we are spending our 7th year of marriage happy, yet poor : ) I guess next year we need to coordinate the spending of the dollars...


Anyway, I started this post thinking that I was going to rant and rave about what a good husband I have and how much I love him (I have a GREAT husband and I love him mucho mucho, and I find new reasons to love him a little bit more almost every day). But I think this poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning pretty much sums it up (and it's not embarrassingly mushy so I don't think you will suffer too much)

“I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you.
I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me.
I love you for the part of me that you bring out.”



I think we were pretty successful and happy for the first 6 years. So, Ryan, what do you say? You want to try for 6(0) more?

Marco Island, FL

Every year Ryan's work hosts an Annual General Meeting, in which they fly all of their employees (& families, yea!) to a resort and have lots of meetings (parties & fun). This year we went to Marco Island, FL from May 8th to May 11th.

Sadie, being the big, grown up girl that she is, was left at home for the very first time! I thought that it would be really hard and that I would worry lots, but, surprisingly, I really didn't worry at all. And although I love her dearly and I did miss seeing her, I have to admit that it took me a day or two... or all of the days we were gone... to want to come back. It was a much needed couples only vacation. Although, not so romantical seeing as we were surrounded by all of Ryan's co-workers. Thank you to my friend, Heidi, & my mom and dad for watching Sadie. I didn't have to worry while we were gone because I knew she was getting the best care possible. If I worried at all it was because I wasn't 100% sure that she was being on her best behavior...

We spent our days lounging pool side or strolling the white sand beaches. I even got in a beach run (I love beach runs!!!) And we spent our evenings partying it up with all the Fasties (this is what the employees of Ryan's work have named themselves...they work for Fast Enterprises...)


The first night is always just a meet and greet where you can catch up with old friends that work on other projects. This is the first year that we actually knew people that had been transferred. It was so fun to see all of the ex-Utahans. (It is scary to think that in not the too far future we will be the ex-Utahans!!!)


Day 2 we spent pool side, and it just happened to be mothers day. I can't ask for a better mothers day gift than being able to spend the whole day by the pool reading a good book! That night was the big formal dinner. My date was so hot!


The last day is the big family event. This year it was a big carnival down on the beach. They even had jet skiing and sailing available. The party wasn't much fun because Ryan and I spent the whole time standing in line waiting to ride the jet skis, but it was so worth it! We got to see dolphins pretty close up, ride some wild waves and see the beauty of the 10,000 islands.

All in all a fabulous first trip away from the Sades. A wonderful time with Ryan. Lots of sun, way too much food and a good time seeing all of our friends! Can't wait until next year.


We only took our camera to the formal event, so that is what all the pics are of. Kinda sad, because it was a beautiful beach and resort. I wish I wasn't so terrible at remembering!

All of the Utah project in their awesome green attire!

My hot date!

And we aren't the drunk ones.... Every one should try sitting our table and then they will know how much fun you can have even when you aren't drinking!