Liam is 2!

Yesterday D & I went up north to spend some time with my family for our nephew Liam's 2nd birthday party. Besides being pretty chilly and rainy, we had a great time. Nothing gets in our way of having fun! I just can't believe Liam is 2 already! My, how time flies!

The Birthday Boy

Uncle D & I gave him this sweet bubble sword. We didn't wrap it, so it got some good lovin' right away!

Big sister, Hannah, led us in singing "Happy Birthday"

Birthday boy enjoying his cake and ice cream

Baby Dokada kept me nice and warm while I kept her out of the breeze

Love this little nugget! I can't believe she's almost 5 months old already!

My little sister, Brianna, and me. People say we look a lot alike. . . except I have blonde hair, and more meat on my bones :)

My sister, Shannon, brought these comparison pictures to show everyone.
Liam is on the left, his dad, Jonathan, is on the right.

Opening presents!

The rest of his gift from Uncle D and Aunt K
Sidewalk chalk. . .

. . . and a Mega Magnifier! He spent the most time on this one. I'm glad he liked it :)

Liam was so happy to be the center of attention. Man! I love this boy! Happy Birthday, Bubba!

Days like today.

Today is one of my favorite kinds of days. Although I love sunshine, I also LOVE rain!! I'm perfectly content today because I have the chance to snuggle up on the couch in a cozy blanket reading a good book while listening to the rain fall outside. I LOVE days like today! The 2 things that would make it better would be to have a really good Eastern rainstorm with thunder and lightning, and to have my hubby here with me. Only 2 more weeks, and that dream will come true. Yay for summer vacation!!

Sucked in!

Before I graduated I was determined to read a lot of good books that I hadn't had the chance to read while keeping my nose in my studies. (I have a whole list of books that will keep me busy for a while!) There's nothing like sitting down with a good book, and looking at a clock to see what time it is, only to discover that HOURS have passed by without you even realizing it! (I know. . . most of you are saying "just wait until you have kids!") I started last week with some pretty popular ones because I had to find out what I've been missing out on. I've already read 2 really great books, and started the 3rd today. (Not to mention I read the entire New Moon novel yesterday & I still deep-cleaned our shower & made dinner, too! Go me!) I'm sure most of you are familiar with:


I'll probably have the series completely read by early next week. And I do love it! My sweet husband just looks at me and laughs because I'm so sucked into it! (I've been laying on the couch reading for hours on end over the last week while he studies his brains out for a comprehensive exam he has tonight of his last 2 years of grad school. What a wife I am! Good luck, Baby! And thanks for letting me enjoy my vacation while you slave away over you studies! I LOVE YOU!!) Now I can't wait to watch the movies! I've been holding off on watching them until I could get the books read--there's nothing like ruining a good book by watching the movie first!!

Anyway, I hope none of you will ruin any secrets for me as I finish the Twilight saga this next week. I just hope you'll all remember back to when you read it for the first time and how exciting it was for you too! :)

So far, after reading the first 2, I'm totally Team Edward. No competition! And thanks again to Courtney for letting me borrow your books!

P.S. I'm also very open to suggestions of other good books to read. Throw 'em at me!!

-HAPPY READING-

Let the GARDENING begin!

The weather FINALLY cleared up enough for us to plant our garden!! So Saturday was the day to do it. It was beautiful outside! I even got my first sun-exposure of the season :) Now it's supposed to snow again this week, so hopefully all of our tender seeds and starts we planted will survive. (I'm still kind of new at this whole gardening thing, so maybe I'm a little over-concerned?)

But, first I wanted to share pictures of the really neat clouds we had on Friday and early Saturday morning. I LOVE clouds--I get that from my grandma :)

Cool clouds, huh? They reminded us of ripples in the sand, and it made me miss Oregon. Again.

But, onto our gardening story: I've really grown to love gardening--no pun intended. I love working outside with Dar (love doing anything with him, for that matter), and working outside and getting my hands dirty is fun for me (as long as the dirt doesn't get under my fingernails, anyway). I love looking at all we have accomplished after a hard day's work.

Just the rows, nothing else done to it yet.

Next, we made a list of the seeds and starts we needed to buy so we could get them in the ground!

Planting some green beans! Mmm! Can't wait!

D planting some zucchini! Mmm! Again :)

Then it was time for some water. Get those seeds germinating!!

One of the many fruit trees. We can't wait for them to start producing. This one is a pear tree.

And another shot of the back yard with the tire swings our nieces and nephew like to play on.

On top of everything we planted in the garden, we have a pot of cilantro inside (our fingers are crossed that it will grow), and we're trying to germinate some soy beans before we plant them because we were totally unsuccessful with the soy beans we planted last year.

And, I don't know if I ever got the pictures up from last year, but here are some of the fun things we got to do with the garden last year that we look forward to again this year:

Mmm! Fresh cherries!

Snappin' green beans

Canning apricot jam!

Weeding. . .

And picking the fruits of our labor!

We can't wait for our Gardening 2010 Adventures! Stay tuned!

Happy Mother's Day!!

Yesterday was a good day. It was extremely difficult for me in some ways, but it was a really good day in a lot of ways too. Church was not as hard to get through as I anticipated, which I was very grateful for. I've had several breakdowns in Sacrament meeting over the last few months, and I was able to keep myself composed yesterday--well, mostly. I only cried twice yesterday, and one of those times was when my sweet husband gave my his very thoughtful gift. I LOVE it, Babe! Thank you!! You seriously are THE BEST!!

After church we were able to go visit Dar's grandmother and we spent a couple hours visiting with her. I called my mom and Omie to wish them a happy Mother's Day, and sent text messages out to my sisters. Then Dar & I went and spent some time with his great Aunt Louise, who would have been alone for Mother's day otherwise. We had a delicious dinner with her--french dip, garlic roasted potatoes, and cheesecake for dessert! We had a great time visiting and spending time with her. I loved the stories she and Dar's grandmother told us. It's so fun to listen to stories of their past and learn wisdom from their experiences!

We hope you all had a very wonderful Mother's Day too!

P.S. If you feel so inclined, I wrote about mother's day as well - with a little bit of a different feel, but both are completely honest - on my other blog. To read it, click here.

GRAD-U-A-TION!!

It was such a neat experience for me to have the opportunity to participate in commencement and convocation as part of the graduation ceremonies for UVU on Friday. During commencement, President Holland shared with us that the night before he had asked his family at dinner what he should say to the graduates the next day. His 7 year old daughter spoke up without missing a beat, "Dad, just tell them, 'Congrats! Badda-bing, badda-bip, have a great summer!'" What a cleaver little girl! It really stuck with me, and it's probably the most memorable thing that was said :)

What was even more special for me was having my amazing husband and family come to support me. This really has been an unforgettable journey and I am so glad they were there to share the finale with me. I am so blessed to have had the opportunity to spend the last 4 years working towards my baccalaureate degree and that, in turn, has blessed my life immensely! I have had the opportunity to meet and work with incredible people and professors, and I have learned so much about myself and what I can set forth and accomplish. Thanks to everyone who has been there to offer encouragement and support through this whole process, being my cheerleaders on the sidelines. This degree would have been much harder to achieve without all of your love and support.

The person I have to thank the most, of course, is my amazing husband, Darwin. I honestly can't say enough good about him!! It's hard to know if I would have even gone to college if it weren't for him. Dar is the one who helped me go through the application process, helped me get registered for my classes, buy my books, and show me where my classes would be so I wouldn't feel like a silly, lost, high school student during my first few semesters. He has been my #1 cheerleader and support. He has been the one to encourage me to try my best, and has always been the first to tell me how proud he is of me. He worked so hard to provide for our little family so I wouldn't have to work which allowed me to be able to focus completely on my school work and get good grades. You truly are amazing!! So, thank you, Darwin for helping me become a better person, for loving me, and having faith in me that I could do this. I couldn't have done it without you!!

Janice, Me, Courtney

Janice & I were the only ones in the entire school with white stoles. We earned them from the NCFR (National Counsel on Family Relations) through our volunteer service and high GPAs. Yay for us, Janice!!

Me & my most amazing #1 fan!

My proud parents :)

My fam that came to support me.
My in-laws came too, but they had already left by the time we got out and had a chance to take pictures.

-Thank you all for coming! Love you all!-After the graduation ceremonies we had a combined graduation party for Darwin and me. He'll be done with his masters degree in August. One more semester to go! I'm so proud of you, babe!

Here are some of our honors and recognitions that we displayed.

My beautiful honors medallion. I graduated Magna Cum Laude.
I have to brag about my husband for a second. He was invited to be a part of Phi Kappa Phi because of his awesome grades. He has a straight 4.0 for his entire master's program!! He falls in the top 10% of graduate students, and will graduate Summa Cum Laude when he finishes in August. We're planning to go to Mississippi in December so he can walk. Can't wait!
And, my awesome friend, Ruachel, made these incredible cakes for us. Mine is a logo for UVU that makes a claw representing our mascot, the Wolverine. Dar's is his Mississippi State University logo. They were delicious!! Thanks again, Ruachel! You're amazing!!

And again, thanks to all of you who came to show your love and support at our party, and to those of you who wanted to be there but couldn't make it. We love you all and are so happy to have you in our lives!

Spreading our Aussie Pride

So our good friends, J & T, who are in Australia right now have taught us a lot about Australia and the fun traditions they have. One of our favorites is the TimTam Slam. Although Aussie burgers come in at a close 2nd. Recently we taught some friends in our ward how to do TimTam Slams - it really is harder than it looks, at least I think it is. D explains how to do it the right way:


And I demonstrate how not to do it. I still don't get why it's so hard for me. Apparently I need more practice :)


P.S. Thanks, Ruachel for sharing your videos with us!

The Final of the Finals

That's right. It's the final of my finals. No longer will I have to stress over my professors slamming everything on me during the last few weeks -or even days- of the semester. No longer will I have to stay up into the wee hours of the night studying for a test I might possibly bomb the next day. No longer will I have to try to read my professor's mind and guess how he/she might grade me.

Actually, it really hasn't been that bad. It has really been an incredible experience. But...as of next Tuesday I will be FINISHED WITH MY LAST FINAL EVER!! Okay, maybe not EVER, but at least until we decide it's time for me to go to graduate school.

I finished up my last day of classes today...actually about an hour ago. I have a take-home final to finish over the weekend and turn in Tuesday morning, and then a 2 hour yoga practice after that. What better way to finish off your final semester -after all the intellectual exposure, all the cramming and learning over a 4 year period of time- than with a 2 hour yoga workout? I'm totally stoked!

Yesterday was one of the most stressful days of my life, but it's over. End of story. Thank goodness for a husband who reminds me that stressful days are not the end of the world, and regardless of the grades I get this semester, I will still graduate with honors. He always knows how to lift me up and make me feel better. Thanks, Babe! This has been an incredible journey for both of us. I've learned so much and grown so much more in the last 4 years. It's hard to say good-bye to UVU, but I am oh so excited at the same time!

Watch out for graduation pictures coming up after next Friday! Woo! Hoo!

Just what I needed.

Apostle Orson F. Whitney (1855-1931) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, explained: "No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God . . . and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we came here to acquire."

Trials give us opportunities to show the Lord and ourselves that we will be faithful. We can choose to feel sorry for ourselves and ask, "Why me?" or we can grow from our trials, increase our faith in the Lord and ask, "How can I be faithful in the midst of this trial?" We can let adversity break us down and make us bitter, or we can let it refine us and make us stronger. We can allow adversity to lead us to drift away from the things that matter most, or we can use it as a stepping-stone to grow closer to things of eternal worth.

Spiritual growth can often be achieved more readily by trials and adversity than by comfort and tranquility. Trials can teach us that faith in God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ is the source of inner strength.

-Elder David E. LeSueur
March 2010 Ensign, p. 28-29

Thought for the day:

Healthy love is like Post-it notes--a little sticky, but not too sticky.

-Huang, 2005

coming to an end

I seriously can't wait to graduate. 3 weeks from today. But at the same time I honestly can't express how much I'm going to miss being in school at UVU. I love school! I love knowing that my hard work pays off and that I've put forth my best effort in all of my classes--most of the time, anyway.

I've had senioritis for a couple months now, or pretty much all semester, really. But it really makes me sad that this fun adventure of my undergraduate endeavor is coming to an end. The degree I've been working towards all my academic life is finally here! (Although now that I've been in college and loved it so much I want to get my master's degree eventually too, but I don't feel like right now is the time to do it.)

So, here I stand ready to move onto the next stage of my life of deciding what I really want to do with myself when I grow up. I thought I had a plan, but that plan took a turn in a direction I didn't expect. So, here I am back at square one. Wish me luck and decisiveness! Indecisiveness is something I've been struggling with a lot lately. Ask my sweet husband! Thanks for your patience and encouragement, Babe!