Random Thoughts

Today is Friday.

That makes me so happy.

Unlike last week, this week has just flown by.

I think it helps that my boss has hardly been in to work.

I have not been a little late to work almost every day this week.

I have not had a really hard time getting out of bed in the morning.

This may or may not have to do with us going to bed later every night.

Last night we did not stay up just to watch Iron Chef.

One of the teams kept drinking shots every 15 minutes.

I was amazed they didn't pass out.

But they were Texans, so I guess they can hold their liquor. :)

This week my new visiting teachers brought me a cute flower and card.

They were just barely assigned to me this month.

It made me smile.

It's February.

This makes me a little sad.

I thought I would be having a baby this month.

But I'm trying to stay positive.

I am almost done with my current cross-stitch project.
I think I'm going to make a tree skirt next.
Hopefully I'll have it done in time for Christmas.

I'm already excited for Christmas.
Again, it's February.
:)

A few weeks ago, Brian drew this Family Crest in Sunday School.
I love that my husband can draw.
He put it into PhotoShop last night and did some editing.
I like it.

My sister turned 14 yesterday.
My baby sister.

I'm not old enough for that.

She was 6 when I went to college.

My friend Marci mentioned Disneyland on her blog.

Now I want to go there too.

I love Disneyland.

My uncle wants to live on Main Street when he retires.

I would definitely consider that.

My other sister is coming to visit in a couple weeks.

I am so excited.

I love when our whole family can be together.

Next Sunday is Valentine's Day.

I have gifts for Brian picked out that I will not be spreading out to count for Valentine's and our anniversary.

I am not that cheap.

But I do love my husband.

I keep having weird dreams.

I'm main characters in TV shows.

Like Pam in The Office.

Or Casey in Greek.

I have no idea why.

I am thinking about cutting my hair.

I don't know how short I want to go.

I never know what looks good on me.

I hope everyone has a good weekend!

Is it Friday yet?

So last week flew by because I didn't have to work Monday. This week however has dragged since the moment I woke up Monday morning. I had my days totally messed up and thought yesterday was Thursday and that today should be Friday and that just made me sad when I realized I was wrong. Usually I love Thursdays because it means the weekend's almost here, but today, I'm angry at Thursday. We're not speaking.

We've had a few exciting things happen last week though. First, our good friends had their baby boy! Congrats Preece's! We took dinner over to them on Friday and I got to hold him for probably an hour. I loved it! I told Brian we need to go over again so I can get my dose of baby every so often.

On Saturday Brian got home from work early, which was happy, except it was mostly because he had lots of work to do at school. So I decided to join him. Some of you may remember how we lived in the Architecture building his first semester of the program. We were "living" in Bountiful, but he would have to stay until 3 or 4 in the morning, and we'd be back at 7. So I spent a lot of hours in that building, just chilling and keeping him company, because we carpooled. As soon as we moved down to the Village, I stopped going. I liked sleeping in my own bed and not in his work chair. Well, I liked sleeping, period. So I haven't really been back since. Sure, I would take him dinner, or help him move his stuff back after a new semester, but I haven't really stayed and hung out. So I thought it was time.

We ended up staying until 12:30AM. I brought my cross-stitch and listened to my book on my Ipod. The time went by really quickly actually, but it made me remember those good 'ol days. I really like being with Brian and he liked having me there, and it helped me appreciate all over again how hard he works on his projects, but I don't think I'll start staying with him every night like I used to.

On Sunday we found out that Brian's grandma was in the hospital because of chest pain. We went to visit her, and I still don't know the whole story. It sounds like she had a heart attack, but then she mentioned something about heart disease, and then some octopus thing, and curly-cue arteries. It's all very confusing, and a little scary. We need to go talk to our doctor friend Landon and see what he could tell us, but she's home now, so hopefully she recovers quickly.

Then like I said, this week has dragged on. But tomorrow is Friday, which is sort of happy. So maybe I'm not quite so mad at Thursday.

I Heart Long Weekends

I really do love when there's a long weekend. It makes Friday such a happier day, and then Sunday I don't start getting that depressing feeling about going back to work. I wish all weeks started on Tuesday instead of Monday.

On Saturday Brian had to work, but that night he took me out to dinner. Always fun to go on a real date.

Sunday we had great church meetings, and then after church we headed over to his parent's house. We parked my new car in the same spot we usually do, but which is also the same spot where the Jeep got hit. Is there such a thing as side-of-the-street-parking-aphobia? That's what I have now. :) Just kidding.

We had a good night just hanging out with Brian's family. We watched the new Star Trek movie, which was OK, but not my favorite. Sorry, I'm not a Treky. We also had some really good lemon chicken with artichokes and some healthy bread I can't remember the name of. It's meals like that that make me want to be a better cook. But then I see the effort it takes and I just lose my resolve.

Yesterday was a great day that Brian and I got to spend together. I love when we just have a whole day where we don't have to do anything except what we want and we can do it all together. We ended up doing some grocery shopping, during which I started on my other goal of trying to save us more money by using coupons. I'm still in the planning stages and mapping out prices, but I'll get there. Even just planning meals saves us a bunch of money.

Then we went to the DI to look for a chair for Brian to use at school. We didn't end up finding him one, but I got 5 new books, for $8! I totalled up how much I saved by buying them at the DI and it was $75! A few months ago I decided that buying books at garage sales was the way to go, and it still is, but when it's cold no one has garage sales. So now I will go to DI.

After that we headed to DownEast to get me a new shirt. I found a long-sleeve black one on sale for $5. When we got to the register, we found out they were having a 50% off everything sale, so it was only $2.50! Sweet deal! I love going shopping when things turn out like that.

We went to another DI but didn't find a chair for Brian, but we had fun looking around. After all the shopping we went to my parent's house and hung out with my family for the rest of the night.

It was a great weekend and very relaxing.

Belated Christmas Gift

I posted before about how our Christmas was really great and we were so blessed. But we did have one not-so-fun thing happen on Christmas Day.

This:
A 16 year old girl ran into our parked Jeep in front of Brian's parent's house. She then proceeded to swerve and end up in their yard. Thankfully, no one was seriously hurt. She was fine, and we weren't even in the car. No, it wasn't snowing, it wasn't icy, and the road was straight. She had just received an Ipod adapter for her car and was trying to learn how to use it, while driving! So stupid.

This is my Jeep:

The left wheel and rim are totally crunched and the axle got pushed forward. You can't see but she pushed the front of our car up onto the curb.

But this is her car:

Not so good. I would say we got the better deal as there seemed to be less damage at first sight, but my Jeep was a 1994. Not worth enough to repair. But it was the most reliable of our vehicles. I've had it for 6 years and had hardly any problems. Sure the air conditioning didn't work anymore, but it's 15 years old! I drove it to and from work every day and it made multiple trips to and from Logan with no problems. I loved my Jeep.

Funny thing is, we didn't even hear anything. The girl's brother came up to the door to let us know what had happened. Then we got to have the fun experience of calling the police and dealing with this girl's half-drunk father (at 2:00 in the afternoon). But we finally got it sorted out and the policeman was very nice and helpful, at least to us. (They almost had to arrest the father because he was arguing with the officer.)

We continued on with our Christmas activities but it was weird to just clean out the Jeep and walk away.

Fortunately, the insurance company we worked with (GEICO) was extremely efficient and helpful. They offered us a little bit more than I thought we would get so that was nice. And last week when we got back from St. George, we were able to go car shopping and find my new car!

A 2004 Subaru Outback:

Brian had put the idea for this car in my head a few months ago, and we were thinking of buying on in a year or two when Brian's done with school, but this even pushed everything up. Because of the insurance money and a nice bonus from my work, we were able to get this wonderful car. I totally love it! Brian loves it too and keeps trying to think of excuses so he can drive it. :)

So this was my late Christmas present this year. Not what I had asked for or expected, but much appreciated nonetheless.

Bringing in the New Year

To bring in the New Year, Brian and I (and my parents and two siblings) went down to St. George to spend it with my sister and her husband. We happened to leave on the snowiest day possible, and it took us 6 hours to get there, but it was well worth it. It may have only been 40 degrees outside but we rolled our windows down when we drove the Boulevard because we were so happy it was warm. :) (We quickly rolled them up soon after.)

We got to spend a lot of time with Nat & Adam, and Brian got to go biking so we were all happy. We went to see the movie Avatar on New Year's Eve and got out at 11:55pm. Just in time to race home and watch the fireworks and ring in the New Year.

I really liked the movie though. I thought I wouldn't because it was so futuristic and seemed like a guy movie, but I loved it! It's a long movie but you don't get bored at any point. And the story is really good. Everyone says it's Pocahontas in the future, which is kind of is, but it's at least Pocahontas for adults. :)

On New Year's Day we slept in a little, and then helped Nat & Adam move. They've been living in his mom's house while she was on a mission, but now she's back and they wanted to get their own place. They moved to this really great one-bedroom apartment with a huge kitchen and living room. Well, comparatively speaking. :) But I really liked it and I think they'll like it too.

It was great to just hang out and be with family and relax in "warm" St. George. I was not too excited to come back to the cold. :(

Merry Christmas!

Our Christmas was great this year!

For Christmas Eve we headed to the annual Barlow Party. This year it was at my parent's church building. We've gotten so big in numbers that one house doesn't hold us anymore. We had a wonderful dinner, a beautiful program, and a fun gift exchange.

We spent the night at Brian's parent's house this year. His youngest brother Stuart woke everybody up at 6:00 AM and we all opened up our presents. We were very blessed this year. I got lots of books and Brian got lots of shirts and model-building stuff.

After we finished at the Glad's house, we got ready and headed up to the Walker's house. They were just starting their gift opening (around 9:00) so we didn't miss much. It was great to see my siblings open the presents we got them. I made my brother Phil a huge crocheted blanket. I hope it keeps him warm.

Finally, for both of our parents, we (as in all the kids) got them a large framed picture of the temple they were married in. (St. George for my parent's, Salt Lake for Brian's) I think they loved those best of all.

My parents immediately hung theirs on the wall.

I was so proud of Brian for taking such good pictures.

We spent the rest of the day with Brian's family and ended up at his Grandparent's house for dinner and more family time.

Overall a very good Christmas.

Still Going Strong

On Friday Brian was totally finished with finals, and my boss wasn't coming into work. So Brian came to take me to lunch and I was leaving early. So it was a pretty good day to start with.

Brian took me to Zupa's, which is one of my favorite lunch places. And we even splurged for some cheesecake, so I was a happy girl.

So we just ate our lunch and talked and laughed, because after the two weeks of finals and stress it was so great to be done.

Well, as we were walking out a group of ladies that had been sitting at a table close to us called us over and just said, "Hold on to this," pointing at us together.

It was a great reminder, but also a relationship booster to know that even almost 3 years later, people can tell we're still so very much in love.