Teeth Studying

Well, just an update on David's life... He's studying extra hard for the DAT (Dental Test), besides the fact that he still has regular undergrad classes, working, and trying to figure out what dental schools to apply to...  He's signed up for Friday May 13th to take the dental test.  And yes... I totally encouraged Friday the 13th!!  Hopefully it brings good luck :)

I'm so proud of my baby and all that he's doing.  If you happen to be thinking or praying and want to add him to your list, I'd appreciate it!  He's going to do GREAT with all of the studying and practice tests that he's doing.  What does this mean for me???  Well, it means I don't get to see him much or almost at all...  But the little free time he does have, he gives it all to me!  He should take some time for Wii Mario but unless we do that on the weekend nights (date nights) together, he doesn't even remember we have Mario games too much.  Yeah, that definitely proves he's very focused right now!!

So for me I get to work on projects around the house and find other activities to do, I'm doing okay with my independent time, but I can't wait to have my David back!!!  One project completed was combining all our emails and journal for the before and first year of marriage and putting it into a book - that has been a long project but definitely worth it!

If you need a girlfriend to hang with... let me know :)  And if you happen to have passed the DAT recently and want to help a brother out... do let David know he's going to do just fine! :)

Happy May 13th!!  And next up... June 1st we will be submitting our applications to our top dental schools ---- the list of schools we've picked ---- to come later this month -----

The leaves are changing

Hi!! Happy Halloween month!!

We went shopping/browsing for costumes this past weekend... and look what we found?

Well, I'm actually going to be a Hocus Pocus witch at work, and probably the same for on Halloween as well. But, it was fun to play around, see the costumes, and get more excited for Halloween!! Yes! :)
David and I have LOTS of good plans for the fall and I'm pretty excited about it all... And of course intermingled is a lot of studying and school and work... Okay, I know no one really reads this, but if you are wondering, yes ... David is the new MAN in my life :) And he's the BEST ever. So, that's why most of these posts have been and will have him included through it all... Just FYI. And that's another reason why life is just so grand at the moment...

So, a few weeks ago it actually SNOWED here in Utah. Yes, we live in the crazy weather time. As Court once told me, the weather has PMS. It's definitely true. Hahah. Well, it also is FALL and AUTUMN and hopefully not fully winter yet. Lots is going on like:

• HR Class - Maybe I can devote a whole post to this, but I'm taking an HR Prep Course to get my PHR - Professional of H.R. - in December. It's a big test that's pretty scary to me right now, but hopefully come December I'll be more ready
• My house - So, my roommate Megan moved out sadly, so I could look for a roommate, or not... And also my windows are LEAKING. So that's the bad part of when it rains... I just can't seem to get anyone to fix it. But, maybe someday, probably when I move out. It's a bit hillarious to see me running around with towels and moving furniture into the middle of the rooms so that water doesn't ruin it all. It's not too bad unless it really pours. It's probably getting worse though... so that's one good reason to wish for snow. No more water leakage...
• Work - It's crazy busy at work. I have a LOT on my plate, and I can't seem to get it all done! We had an HR intern for a bit who quit, so I'm up to my ears in projects and am still trying to get filing and other stuff that someone else should be doing done. I've also done a few more Performance Plans and am working hard on our Recognition (ACE) Program and hopefully in a few weeks that will be done so I can work on the Intranet Updates. You'd think I'm the Web techy here, but I sure am not. Oh man... But it's good.
• Church - We have a new bishopric and the boundaries changed, so all changes bring a bit more work, but we're getting it all under our belts. The exciting day will be when I have 3 RS teachers that are called and teaching and I'm not needing to worry about calling someone since another left or moved or whatever... Someday right? Hopefully.
• Social - Well, my only social is David right now. And that's how I like it. So, life is great there. He's in school and working and we just try and fit a little time to see each other every day, and then on the weekends the most.

Looks like Fall is busy huh? And it only gets more during the holidays. But, I'm totally ready for it!! So, Happy Haunting time everyone! I'll get back to you with all the fun that's going on around here soon :)

No place like home

I took a quick trip to visit home over Labor Day weekend.... It surely was a busy vacation, so can you really call it a vacation? Probably huh? It was great. I did tons!

Scorpions - So, yeah, the last time I went to AZ I had the encounter with the scary scorpions. I was well aware and still slightly afraid to sleep, but I was successful and didn't get stung. Thursday night, when I got in, Eric picked me up and drove me to Dad's house. We ate dinner at like 10 pm and then I decided I wanted him to show me how to scorpion hunt. I would be sleeping with a black light and needed to know what to look for if I saw one. Well, probably not the smartest idea I've had... I did see them... but after I saw about 5 crawl out of the back wall of the backyard, I was feeling all creepy crawly and knew I would have nightmares. Amanda (we'll get to her) and I watched from afar as Eric spraid and killed them. The last straw was when #4 scorpion fell from above and probably could have landed on me - I was definitely done after that... hahah. Eww. Sleeping that night was rough to say the least. I woke up every hour and re-checked everything with the black light. Here's what one looks like with the black light on it. It's neon like the color white is in disco lighting etc...

Wakeboarding - I went wakeboarding with Lexie on Friday!! (YES, she happened to be visiting AZ too that week with her family!!). I learned how to almost jump the wake. I totally got a lot better though and had a blast. Boating in AZ was a lot warmer, and more enjoyable for some points. I wish I could do that more!!! We went to the Saguaro lake around 8 am and stayed till about 2. They let me wakeboard a couple times, and after watching all the pros - I figured out how to glide outside the wake and cut back and stuff. Lexie and Rob and his brothers and sisters went as well and they were just awesome. I loved seeing Lexie for the few hours that we could chat. And I think they all had a blast taking a few hours out of the kid life to play as adults. :) (the middle pic is Lexie, yeah I wish I was that good!!)

Lunch - Friday I went to lunch with Dad and Diane. I was able to spend some one on one with both of them a few times over the weekend seeing that I slept at their house, ate with them, taxied around with them, etc etc. I love my parents. It's so nice we can chat and laugh and just have fun together. The funniest part of the lunch, to journal, was when Diane was on the phone with Briand explaining that Max (we'll get to him soon!!!) will adjust to taking a bath soon enough. Her exact phrase was, well, new born babies aren't too comfortable being naked and all exposed. It was hilarious to me because right then I thought - and us as adults like our naked bodies all exposed??? Yeah right!! Hahah, it was just, well, you had to be there....

Mom's b-day Celebration - So I wanted to celebrate Mom's b-day since it would be on 9/11 and I was just missing it by one week. Eric and his girlfriend Amanda came with Mom and I to Teriyaki Kitchen for dinner and then bowling afterwards. It was a lot of fun. I was pretty exhausted, more than that, from boating, so I was pretty impatient but also feeling kind of silly and mom can always be like that, so we all had fun. Amanda fit right in - I love how she can laugh and have fun with us too. And I knew that I had to take advantage of Eric wanting to come - usually if he's dating someone, he's more likely to be outgoing and want to do stuff with his family, so hence, I put it together. I hope mom had a good time :) Eric won the bowling tournament. But we all did pretty good - well, they all did...hahah...

Saturday shopping - Mom and I took a quick trip to Chandler to get some stuff. I realized after about an hour that my body was even more sore, so clothes shopping was out. Sad! Instead I finally got my 24 HR fitness pass from Costco. I've been trying to get it in UT for like 3 weeks, and who knew that all I needed to do was go all the way to AZ to be able to get into Costco and them have the passes and everything... (that's another story I won't go into...)... Shopping just hasn't been my expertise this past month. Oh well...

Maximus Oviatt - So, finally, the reason I came to AZ in the first place was because Briand had her little baby boy!!! Max. He's the cutest thing ever. And I'm not biased at all. Okay, maybe a little. He is my nephew. The first! And so adorable. I'm not the baby expert, but I sure love being around them. He seems to have such a strong neck already and it was only his 4th day here! He has big blue eyes and was awake a lot. I thought babies just slept all the time when they first get here... Anyway, I spent all Saturday afternoon and evening at Briand's house. Dad and Justin left to head to the ASU game... so it was just us girls. I'm so glad I was able to spend a few hours there and get to see the after birth adjustment a bit more. Briand is such a good mom already. Her and Justin were pretty wiped out, so Diane and I tried to just hold and play with Max for the 2 hours he wasn't eating...and they would crash and sleep. Eventually Diane had to run some errands and was pretty tuckered out herself, so I got Max for several hours. And since it's my sisters baby, I felt okay if he would cry and I would still just hold him and try to calm him down. And I actually did!! Awe. Anyway, I could go on and on, but instead I'll post some pictures. Also, a funny story is that earlier yesterday at lunch I knew I'd be eating my words, but I said anyway, that I'm not ready for kids and they are just hard and stuff. But here I was holding Max and I want one!! Yep. Someday though, I'm not ready yet, but I will just have to surround myself with more newborns. I'm sad I won't get to see Max grow except only from afar.

Sunday - I wasn't feeling 100%, so I just went to Sacrament Meeting and then spent some time at mom's. I'm always at home at my house I grew up at.... Then Dad and Diane headed back out to Briand's and I was definitely there!! So, I got a few more hours with Max before I would be heading back to UT. It was so sweet to see my Dad hold him and put him to sleep and then both of them just sitting and rocking and sleeping in the chair. Awe.

Monday - I headed home and was pretty glad to just have a few more hours to take a break from my vacation and spend time with my favorite person David.

I loved visiting home and family. What a great vacation. Thanks everyone for making it such a great trip. I LOVE YOU!!

Summer's coming

WOW. I've been too busy for BLOGGING. What has the world come to?? Not that I've been a blogger for very long though... I wanted to give a update on my Springtime this year so far...

1) Work is great! May 19th means I'll have been here for 1 year. And I'm LOVING it - TONS!! So, if work is good, everything else is lots better right? We're so busy - I'll have to update you more on all the funny stories and exciting stuff going on in another post. But, the short of it - I'm very busy and have lots of new little projects that make me feel important. And today during my annual performance review my boss just said wonderful things about me. It was nice to know that she feels like I really compliment her in my attention to detail and following up and through. I'm now supposed to work on a few 2009 goals, and focuses, but the hard part is that I want to learn it ALL. I told her I'm basically wanting to do stuff that isn't being taken care of right now or something... So, we'll see. And also Shannon and I are going to work on getting our PHR - which is a license and test thing that will strengthen my HR basic knowledge. So - WOW huh? No wonder I don't have time to blog! Haha. I'm doing it during my lunch and weekly payroll update call (sometimes those calls are so not informative or helpful...just a bunch of women arguing...)

2) Socially - life is great as well. I'm making friends in my new ward. I've planned a few outings or gone on a few - Michael Franti Earth Day concert in the SLC Gallivan Center; Jamba Juice and game night at guy in my ward's place (he called me to help him plan...not that I don't do enough planning for work or calling right?); and then an outing bowling with some ward peeps as well. As well as a Real soccer game with my best boy Jon, and BYU baseball and Provo visit with Emily and Jon too (but Emily denied a picture of that, so it's not below). Life has been crazy busy - with church, life, family stuff, etc... I'm not home too much the last 2 weeks. We had stake conference as well and I sang in the choir and we met at the Assembly Hall on the SLC Visitor's Center - that was amazing! And we went and did a session at the SLC temple as a stake and I loved that as well. I hadn't been to that temple since I went with my family.

Here are a few pictures of the Springtime. I just absolutely L O V E this weather. I've got to stay outside and not get burnt though. And then soon I'll probably say it's too hot, so I'm trying to really soak it up right now.

This is Katie above. She's just great! She's the RS President that I work with and also play with a lot of the days of the week... She's got the recent RM spirit still with her so that helps keep me in line :) And below are the rest of the crew I put together for bowling. I was pretty happy since I didn't think I had too many friends I could round up, but they came! Lara, her bro, David, Tess (Katie's roommate and another one I just love, but she just moved to Provo dang), Eric, and Jon. It was super fun! I almost won, dang Eric started getting good towards the end though.

So I haven't been eating the best lately - but I decided to start buying lots of greens and veggies and maybe someday I'll be good for the China diet thing, but for now, I loved the meal I whipped up one day - and took a lovely picture. It tasted pretty tasty :) Too bad I don't have anyone to cook for yet! They're actually pretty lucky seeing that most the time my dinners are like randomness of tortillas, chips and salsa, carrots, burgers, or nothing....

And then we've got the Real game on May 6th with Jonny boy and his friends. It was lots of fun, but the thing I missed was that the announcer didn't talk too much and so I had a hard time following. And no music - what is that? And Sean and Tony ended up being there sitting about 20 rows below me! Family close is great... Luckily at the baseball game there was music a few days later and Jonny showed up for that one too and he ate 2 hot dogs! I had one and the frozen lemonade I had been craving with Emily. Emily and I also spent the afternoon together chatting and played rockband, etc.

Update...

So, I haven't written for awhile. Sorry! I know all my devoted readers....

1) My arm started itching like crazy this week. Why?? After a day of itching I realized - WAIT, that's where I was bit!! Stupid Scorpion. So, I took some benedryl thanks to Steph... but no one told me that I'd basically CRASH. I missed the rest of that night. But it was nice to kinda catch up on some needed sleep :) The arm still itches, but I'm avoiding the scratching....

2) I spent last weekend in Provo for General Conference. I went to my mission reunion with Courtney and we brought "rent-a-dates"... yep. Ben and Jon were good sports. I mean, I think that's the last one I will go to for a long time. I'm done with that stuff. I've been to 2 every year since I've been home. And there's not much else I can answer about my life and I really don't need to hear my Pres say "Get Married" and "Move every 6 months" again. Too bad that once when he said that I thought he was saying that as he was inspired to, but he does it all the time!

3) General Conference was great! I took pages of notes, watched with roommates and friends, and felt thoroughly uplifted. I had WAY too many favorites to outline on here. But I did go in with my questions and I came out with answers. Whoohoo.

4) Work has been EDUCATIONAL. I am finally learning how to deal with problem employees or disputes between employees and managers etc. I took part in putting an employee on an Improvement Plan, or she'll be canned in a month. It was sad to see her cry, but it seems like she needs to take a step up. Then I have spent many hours after that meeting basically "counseling" both the employee and the manager. Which I think is somewhat HILLARIOUS, seeing that I haven't ever done an improvement plan before. Plus, I don't even know the process or many of the answers to their questions. Luckily I get to run to Jayne my boss who says I'm doing fine. But it's a good experience. I felt pretty worn out yesterday after about 3 hours of it!! I wasn't ready to handle any other "emotional" problems. My main message to this employee was to stop being the "victim" and really do something and take a step up. I mean, if I was being evaluated as "poor" I would run in and talk to my manager and try to figure out what I could do rather than moping around and saying it's not my fault. Okay..... I'm not supposed to pick sides am I??? Trying not to... But, what I am learning!!! And there's no way I could learn this at school. Hopefully after a few of these I'll at least know what to advise and feel more confident.

5) Umm... nada mucho. Nothing much is left that I can think of. This weekend it's Easter. It's still cold, but I can see a few blossoms on the trees and that makes me happy.

Happy Easter Everyone!

Friday the 13th

It's Friday the 13th!!

YES!!! I LOVE this day :) :) :) Yeah, I guess I'm weird....we all knew that already though.

This week hasn't stopped since it started being crazy...I've had activities every night without stop. Here's what my schedule looked like:

Monday - work till 5ish, dinner, FHE till 930 (learning dancing), the gym till 11...sleep at 12ish
Tuesday - work till 5ish, dinner, salsa dance class till 8, institute (i was late) till 930, gym till 11, sleep eventually
Wednesday - work till 5ish, dinner, enrichment 7 till 830, dinner with an old friend till 11...sleep
Thursday - work till 5ish, let out Sammy (watching cousin's dog), temple trip with the ward at Bountiful from 630 till 11, shower, go back to Stephs and let out Sammy...and finally sleep
Friday - work till 5ish, let out Sammy, go home and get ready for the dance, go out on date, ...
Saturday - hope this day is pretty free!! Still have the dog though...
Sunday - breakfast with new members at 1030, choir 12, church 1-4, dinner group 530, ward prayer 830...
AND then it starts all over again next week!! I think I'm feeling like my plate is too full - I have other things I want to do, but my schedule is just FULL.

I really want to watch a SCARY movie tonight. But I'll probably freak out because I'm already going to be sleeping in a empty house with a crazy dog, and it's just too huge to walk around with a knife and make sure no one's there... (Yes, I totally do that sometimes).

I've had some funny experiences lately, so here's my list to write about next time:
- Salsa Dancing in Sandy; - Finding a 2nd Cousin; - "the rules" for gals looking for men...

But, these will have to be at a later date... Have a spooky night :) Oh yeah, and it's that other day tomorrow - hence the red writing (well, i tried that, but you couldn't read it on the purple background....so just imagine) - Valentines Day right? Awe... Enjoy the love if you have it...