Spring Time Updates

Greetings earthlings ✌

Since we last chatted I mentioned we were getting ready to move, so let's just pick up right where we left off!

FEBRUARY

The last two weeks of January going into the beginning of February was a little crazy. Marie Kondo has nothing on me because I'm pretty sure I got rid of just about anything that wasn't a necessity. Downsizing from 2600 sq ft to 1140 sq ft is serious business! Nonetheless, we were successful and we managed to move in with very little issues. There were some things that made us nervous at first (some repairs needed to be done and the apartment reeked of cigarette smoke, which we learned was coming from the neighbor thru the open living room window). 4 months later and we're quite cozy in this little home we've got. I enjoy only taking no more than an hour to clean the entire apartment, as opposed to the 3 hours it took by myself in the old house. I wish I had a little bit more room to spread out, but it's not uncomfortable so I can't really complain. Our ward has been super friendly, and is quite literally the opposite from what we came from! Our old ward was comprised mainly of young families with lots of kids and babies, where this ward has a trailer park and senior community in the boundary so most of the ward consists of grandma and grandpas! We've also learned that they LOVE music, and there is one musical number every single week (except fast Sunday). I usually stay under the radar for as long as possible--took the old ward nearly 3 years to find out I sing--this time it only took 2 weeks, and I've already sung a musical number and have been asked to sing in the adult session of Stake Conference. Meh. (Honestly it's fine, I just don't like to draw attention to myself at my place of worship since that's not what it's about). We also went and played in the SNOW. The weather this winter was crazy, being much colder than it usually is and we've been getting a lot of rain as well so that means snow! It even snowed in Cave Creek, which isn't that far out of the Valley! We drove up maybe an hour out of Phoenix and pulled off the road to the perfect fresh powder and had a blast! Max and Bri tagged along too!

MARCH

Work has been consistently INSANE officially since it's the middle of tax season and this season has been weird and stressful. I've been making all sorts of silly mistakes that have snowballed and honestly it's taken a toll on my confidence. I've gotten better and I'm hoping it stays that way?
Anyway, March was a bit of a blur--working long hours, going to friends' recitals, getting food poisoning from Olive Garden, and *finally* taking our anniversary photos. It was crazy but pretty good. {if you want to see my favorites (which are many), they are at the very end!!}

APRIL

The home stretch of tax season! Plus Ian's birthday. :) We went to dinner with his family and some of his friends at Texas Roadhouse! He even rode the saddle and loved every second of it. 😆
We also saw Wicked while it was at Gammage--I don't care who you are, if you don't like Wicked there is something wrong with you, and you should really get that checked out. It's incredible to watch every time. I haven't seen it since I was 18 (neither has Ian!), and it was so fun to watch it again but this time with my husband. I'm glad I married someone who will watch musicals with me, though I'm slowly starting him on operas...hehe We saw Silent Night at Arizona Opera and it is now one of my favorites, and Ian actually liked it! Soooo good. Slowly but surely he's coming to the dark side....

This year's Easter was an extra fun one--my brother Nathan and his 4 kids came to visit for a whole week! We got to roast hot dogs and marshmallows outside, watch movies, go to the zoo, and eat yummy food on Easter Sunday together. It had been a couple years since I'd seen them and it was too much fun. I wish they could move closer to AZ!

Ian left for the last two weeks of the month for job training in Austin, and that was a bummer (him leaving me alone for so long!). The only thing exciting to happen during that time was that Avengers Endgame came out--and that was life changing. UGH I love Marvel so much. 😭 I grieved Tony Stark's death for like two days hahaha {SPOILER SORRY if you haven't seen it by now then it's really your fault at this point} But seriously, what an incredible film!

MAY---today!

At last it was finally May, and as of May 1st, that means it's officially part 1 of slow season. There's quite literally nothing to do at work! Which is fine, considering how stressful and long tax season was/is. I've read two books in the last two weeks and I'm going to start another one today. The weather has also been surprisingly heavenly. It's gotten into the triple digits only a couple time so far this month and May is practically over. I don't mind the uncharacteristically good temperatures, and I will soak them up until the oven inevitably preheats come June for sure. In other news, I leave for Chicago in roughly 48 hours for 5 whole days! This will be my first solo trip to a destination where I will not be staying with family or be near family at all. I've traveled by myself lots of times, but I've always stayed with family so this will be a new and exhilarating experience! I'm going mainly for a vocal competition in which I advanced to the second round in my division in, but it's also going to be so fun! I've got a whole itinerary planned out (surprise surprise) and I can't believe it's finally here! I've known that I advance for nearly 3 months and waiting around for this has been driving me bonkers. I will definitely have a blog post dedicated for the trip, the details, and the pictures. 😉

Now the moment you've all been waiting for...these beautiful anniversary photos my friend Erin Watson took of us! Literally it's been like a month since I got them and I'm still swooning. I had an idea of what I was wanting and Erin majorly delivered. {Her photography page is Pretty Pixel Photography if you want to see more of her work} Here are my favs, which are basically all of them. Enjoy. 💕

Thanks for reading!

It's been a minute!

oh wow

here I am

nearly 8 months since my last blog post

I HAVE BEEN BUSY OKAY

but I'm glad I'm here now, documenting and such. This is basically my journal, so as long as I manage to be consistently inconsistent and write posts, then I'm happy for posterity's sake. ;)

SO we left off at the beginning of June...a LOT has happened since then. It's going to be interesting documenting our life, since I've organized it around semesters and classes and I haven't paid any attention to anything like that in almost a year (now THAT is a weird statement). So we'll go by chunks of time I guess? heh

JUNE
So I've been working at my same job still--and the summer time is very slow, so it consisted of a lot of "manning the desk". I don't mind, though. It could be so much worse, and I am so thankful for the job and the boss I have! June's main dealio was Girls Camp, and it was the stake's turn this year to plan and execute, so my duties as president was basically to show up and have fun! It had been so dry this past summer that Camp LoMia was closed, so we ended up just having the activities at the stake center. All things considered, the stake leadership did an AMAZING job. They decorated the entire church building to make it look "outdoors", like set up tents, signs, and naked Christmas trees. It was just so stinking hot. But we still had fun! Well, I did for the most part. I tend to put the people I'm responsible for before myself, which isn't a strength when you've been in the sun in the middle of an Arizona summer for nearly 6 hours of the hottest part of the day, so you get heat exhaustion! yay! It was so much fun!

not really. nope.

We went from hiking a "mountain" (glorified hill next to the Phoenix temple) early in the morning but it was still stupid hot by the time we got done around 9am, and then we were at Big Surf from about 11:30am-3:00pm. During that time, I was starting to feel lightheaded so I tried sipping water and cooling off in the shade, but it wasn't helping a ton. Then on the car ride home, my car overheated on the freeway and I followed suit. It was not an exaggeration to say that I myself was a hot mess. Poor Claire was in the car with me while my sanity melted away with my body's ability to cool down. It was awful, because when your body gets to that point of overheating (and looking back I probably should have gone to the ER for fluids), your body kind of "resets" so I couldn't hold anything down for 2 days during camp and I missed all the fun parts like lipsyncs. My fantastic leaders were there to make sure the girls had a great time though, and that's all I wanted anyway!

JULY!

July was a pretty fun month! I got to visit my mom and sister in Hunstville, AL for a whole week! Allegiant flies pretty cheap out there during the summer so it only made sense! I had a blast. I definitely understand the draw to move there...it's green EVERYWHERE and the weather is fairly mild (even with the humidity). We went shopping, at great food, and I even got to go spelunking for the first time---which was my favorite part of the whole trip! I slid down a mudslide, waded in 4.5 ft of ice cold water, did the "polar bear" challenge in a deeper part of said ice cold water, and army crawled through the cave with my mom and my sister, and her in-laws! I wish AZ had caves like that, because I'd be going all the time!
I don't like that half my family moved across the country...but where they moved to isn't so bad. ;)

 before!

after ;)

Twas a very good trip. :)

I also threw a really cool Harry Potter birthday party, which included an Azkaban mugshot photobooth, Ollivander's wand making station, goodies (including a Hagrid's birthday cake), and movie marathon. It was quite epic if I do say so myself. :)

AUGUST

This was a weird month. Ian was gone for half of it (Annual Training with the Marines), so I spent most of this time not doing much since my adventure buddy was gone. I did, however, sing in a vocal jazz group for the first time in yeeaarrsss! It was weird and fun all at the same time. My voice doesn't bend that way as easy as it used to, but the music was mostly Beatles and other fun standards so I didn't mind the change of pace. :) I have an even larger appreciation for "jazzers" than I already did--hats off to you! I will gladly sit in the audience and just bask in the skill that it takes to be good at that sort of thing. ;) 

Now this next part, I am a little uncomfortable sharing, but it needs to be shared because I know that now that I'm out of school I know there are a fair amount of people wondering--when are y'all having the behbehs (babies)? Truth be told, I found out I was pregnant the beginning of the month. I had a happy 7 days of knowing and keeping a fun little secret with my husband and close family, until I miscarried on the 13th. It was a "chemical" pregnancy so to speak, and fortunately my body recognized it quick enough to terminate it on it's own, and I do find that to be a blessing. Sometimes you aren't "lucky" like that, and you go on for another couple weeks making plans and looking forward to the next 9 months until you find out otherwise. 

The reason I'm sharing is because, to be honest, I don't know when (if ever) naturally bearing our children will happen. This isn't meant to make you feel sorry for me, but hopefully it does quell any questions/assumptions and it avoids us from having to keep hearing/answering the same question over and over again. ;) 

anywayyyy

SEPTEMBER!

My favorite month of the year! Our anniversary AND my birthday month. :) I turned 25?? What even is that? We also celebrated FIVE FREAKIN YEARS. I don't feel old enough to have been married that long. #teenbrideoops 

We had plans of taking some pretty pictures for our anniversary, but money has been tight so we'll get to it eventually. Maybe. ;D I guess you can count our new car as our anniversary gift? It was out of necessity, but I'll take it. Ha! It's a beautiful 2015 Dodge Journey that was a Craiglist unicorn find. I'm in love with it. It only had 40k miles on it, and we got it for a screaming good price. 

It was also YW in Excellence, which I was super proud of how well it went! It was an awards theme, so we went all out--fancy decorations, red carpet, dinner, little Oscar trophies, the whole nine yards. My presidency and I ended up getting released a week later, so we definitely went out with a bang! :)

love every single one of these ladies

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER/DECEMBER!

I'm jamming these all together because honestly that's how these last three months have felt. Jam packed and kind of a whirwind. 

During majority of this whole time, I was actually doing keto--which was amazing and awful all at the same time. My body feels a lot better after doing it strictly for that long (and to be honest, I miss how I felt so I'm trying to incorporate a less strict version of it for maintenance), and it's amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it. I have an assortment of imbalances in my body and doing keto for a few months helped me out (er, at least I'm pretty sure it did. I still need to have bloodwork done again). A bonus side effect was losing somewhere in the 15-20lb range--it wasn't my intention but it was a confidence booster getting back to where I was when I got married! I haven't weighed myself because #triggered but I fit in my wedding dress with some wiggle room so I'll take that as a win. Cutting out foods that are inflammatory to my body really help how I feel overall. I got my first headache today since September, which is a huge deal for me! As long as I feel good and not losing my sanity, I'm good. :) Halloween was a little hard since I love me some twix, but good company made up for it. :)

During this whole period of time since I graduated, I've also been taking lessons twice a week--Lots of work has been done! I've pounded opera repertoire like nobody's business and I can hear a significant change in my voice. I still have a lot of improvement to make, but what's nice is that there's nowhere to go but up from here. :) In October, I had the opportunity to sing a few of his art songs for Morten Lauridsen himself (cute the choir nerd fangirling hardcore here). 

I also was able to sing for two separate Messiah (Handel) performances, which has been a bucket list item for me. I love that music and I was finally able to study and then perform it! 

Definitely the highlight of my Christmas season. Thanksgiving was fun spending time with family, eating super yummy food; including a keto friendly French Silk pie that was surprisingly delicious! ;) 

This year was potentially our last USMC ball as well, and may I say, I looked FINE. 

And Christmas was filled with plenty of yummy food, even better company and lots of fun memories. :) we had our last hurrah as our annual NYE party, and though it was smaller than usual, it was still just as fun. I'm just glad I have Ian beside me every time. :)

In addition to the holiday festivities, we've decided to sell our house and move back to Mesa! It has been a bittersweet experience but I'm very excited to be closer to family and to be able to be financially more secure. We're currently in the middle of all of it, so odds are you'll hear all about it in a couple months. ;)

Anyway, this has gotten long so I'll wrap it up. Thanks for reading the novel. 

Goodnight my lovelies. xx