some things from the weekend

hey there.
 well, thanksgiving weekend came and it went.

it was an enjoyable time for us, although we didn't get much relaxing done.

but here are a few things that we did do:

{no, there aren't any pictures for this post, i apologize. blogging at work = no pictures to post}

WEDNESDAY:

 spent the night at IKEA. $1000 later, we have the rest of our kitchen cabinets. again.

THURSDAY:

 Thanksgiving day. we tried to sleep in, but can't ever seem to sleep past 8 or 830 anymore, so we spent the morning in our jammies in bed, watching the Macy's parade. we had Thanksgiving lunch with Jae's family. there was just 7 of us plus baby ben, which was kind of nice. low-key. quiet. looked through all the ads while our food settled. it was nice. (speaking of - chelsea, i can't get that delicious pie out of my head! i must make it.) then it was off to Thanksgiving dinner with my family. this time, there was 14 of us, 6 of which were children. little bit louder! it was so nice to be with everyone. we played some card games while our food settled for a second time.

FRIDAY:

  at 12 am, yes you guessed it, we were out with all the other crazies, standing in line, freezing our bums off, waiting to do some black friday shopping. we only went to one store, target, and only got a few small things. camera, one of target's famous super-soft blankets, and a dvd. and for those 3 things, we stood in the checkout line for about 45 minutes. good thing jordan & chelsea were with us or we might not have made it! we finally got home to bed by about 145am. we were back up around 830am and heading down to our house to work. we started painting! alllll day long.

SATURDAY:

priming and painting all day. around 6pm we headed out to our friends cara and adam's house to house/dog sit for them. mary & vince came over and hung out for awhile. we watched sports. big surprise! by about 11pm, we were all pretty tuckered out, and called it a night.

SUNDAY:

8am we were up with doggies and cuddled with them until jae left for work. i left shortly after he did, went home, got ready, went to church. the rest of my afternoon was spent doing laundry and, yep, more painting. jae got off work, we had a quick dinner, and got another couple of hours of painting in. i actually really enjoy painting. but 3 days in a row of it is tiring!

then monday came. and it was back to regular life, which means lots of work and not much time for other things. we were going to go get another coat of paint done at our house but decided we needed a night off - we're worn out.

and that about sums it up. did you like that recap? oh good. hope you all had a

fantastic holiday weekend. now only about 3 more weeks until we have another one!

my list

well. it's official.
tomorrow is Thanksgiving!
what a wonderful time of year it is.
we're so lucky to get to celebrate these things.
so lucky to get the reminder of all things wonderful in life.
here's my list of thankful's this year:

*my amazing husband, Jae
*a warm house (even if we don't live in it yet)
*the ability to work & having a steady income
*spending time with family
*technology
*good friends & co-workers
*the joys that the future will bring
*contacts/glasses to help me see
*music
*seat warmers in the car
*the Gospel
*skype
*the ability to love & be loved
*compassion
*a moving, breathing, fully-functioning body
*freedom
*books to read
*education
*sharpies
*water
*plenty of food to eat
*my health
*happiness

here's to a very happy holiday weekend to everyone!!

i'm {blank} because..

{got this idea from Little Miss Momma}

i'm weird because..
*i have a hard time finishing things i eat...i'll eat 3/4's of a banana or yogurt and throw it away..just because
*i don't like sleeping with the closet door open (although i've gotten more ok with it the last couple years)
*i like to match my hangers to whatever clothing item is hanging on them
*i can shake my eyeballs super fast back and forth
*i really like writing with markers/sharpies/nice gel pens

i'm a bad friend because..
*i don't keep in touch/stay up to date on their lives like i should
*if someone texts or calls me and i'm sleepy, i probably won't respond. sleep conquers all.
*sometimes i have a hard time going out for 'girls nights' cuz i just want to stay home & hang out with jae

i'm a good friend because..
*i pretty much rock at remembering dates and hardly every forget people's birthdays, anniversaries, etc.
*if someone needs something from me, i will do my best to make it happen
*i was a bridesmaid to more friends than i can even keep track of

i'm sad because..
*our house still isn't done
*people are jerks and don't have respect for others or their belongings
*i don't know if we'll get to go to China for our anniversary after all

i'm happy because..
*after a ton of hard work/hours/sweat/tears/muscle/money, our house is this close to being done
*i have Jae
*it's Thanksgiving this week
*i get thursday and friday off this week - paid.

i'm excited for..
*lots of turkey and mashed potatoes and rolls in the near future
*time with family
*having babies
*a new year to begin
*it to be 5 o'clock


{oh, and just to update on 'yesterday', the insurance will NOT cover our
 brand new kitchen cabinets that were taken. awesome.}

yesterday..

..all my troubles seemed so far away...

as soon as i wrote that title, that familiar Beatles tune popped into my head. and it actually kind of fits the tone of this post. i want to write down the events of yesterday, mostly for myself for journaling purposes. this might be a long one, so to warn you..

first of all, my mother's birthday was this past wednesday, and my parents anniversary is today. so we decided to throw a few things together and have a big, extended celebration of both these events yesterday - saturday. most of my family went to see a play in salt lake in the late morning. we then all met together for lunch. pizza factory. delish. next, we all high-tailed it up to my sister's house for more celebrating, cookie & ice cream eating, candles, and present unwrapping. we finally got to give my parents the photobook that us siblings put together (aka snapfish put together for us and sent it to us) of our family trip to Maine this past August. we have been super excited to give this book to our parents. all the anticipation of them seeing the pictures was killing us! (my parents haven't even looked at the pictures from the trip yet....all the pictures are currently still sitting on the memory cards in their cameras....)

anyway, it was a joyous afternoon, and the grandkids were practically climbing all over my mom and dad, trying to look at the photobook too. there was discussion of Thanksgiving dinner, and then we all departed.

my brother-in-law went down to our house with us to help us switch out our porch light. while they were working on that, i got a phone call from my dad saying he had a voicemail from the guy that owns their storage unit place. our conversation went something like this:

dad: have you guys been down to the storage unit lately?

me: um, nope, not for awhile, at least a month or more.

dad: ok, because i got a call from the owner saying they did a lock check this morning and ours doesn't have a lock on it.

*enter heart sinking to the ground...*

me: oh crap.

dad: i'm going to run down there right now and check things out.

i quickly jumped in the truck and drove to meet him there. jae came shortly after that, when i called him hysterically crying.

yes, it is my parents storage unit, and yes, while our house is still under construction, we have lots of our belongings stashed in there, including every single one of our new, still-in-the-box kitchen cabinets.

sure enough. someone broke in and robbed us. the lock was completely gone. they must have busted it and taken it with them. we haven't gone through the entire kitchen list yet, but probably a good half of our brand new cabinets and microwave gone. other boxes were thrown all about. papers all over. the 'extras' for our cabinets (the hinges, etc) all over the ground. most of the storage bins were missing lids, including the one that had our stereo and surround sound speakers, as well as a dvd player and vcr. after thinking more about everything in there, we're realizing there is a side table missing, a bedside table, and who knows what else. they did leave our brand new dishwasher in there. too big and hard to move, i'm guessing.

the cops came, a police report was filed. the crime guy was called out and took pictures of footprints and dusted for fingerprints. but nothing looks too promising.

selfish or not, the thought that kept going through my head while i was driving over there was why do bad things happen to good people? seems kind of silly, i guess. of course crappy things happen. life still goes on. we've just worked so hard on this house. hours and money and sweat and tears. when we finally feel like we're getting so close to all we've wanted these past few months, something like this happens.

to put the icing on the cake, apparently about a month ago, one of the guys that works for the owner of these storage units came to clean one of the units out. at that time, the door of my parents unit was partially open. no lock. he opened it up, thinking it was empty, but found things in it, so he just closed it and went on his way. no mention to his boss or anyone that he'd found it open or without a lock. he'd just assumed people were in the middle of moving out or in, and never said a word. a month ago. no one in our family has been down to the unit since sometime in october, so we had no idea. until yesterday.

i didn't realize i was still so emotional about it until my sister called this morning and we were talking about it. it was all i could do to not start crying again. and still now, as i write it all out, it's overwhelming to think about it. so many emotions so close to the surface still.

but like i said - crap happens.

life goes on, right?
sure.

our house: INSULATION & DRYWALL!!!!

ummm i'm not sure if you heard me. so let me just say it again........INSULATION AND DRYWALL! the last couple of weeks have been full of those two things, and can i just say, i couldn't have expected the happiness i experienced when walking through our house the first time, seeing all the insulation down and the drywall up. thank the heavens above, it's beautiful!

we have had quite the furnace problems lately, though, hence causing mud to not dry on time problems, and it has delayed our drywall/mudding/taping process. everything was supposed to be done today, but very-long-and-very-lame story short, it should all be done by monday.

anyway just wanted to share some pictures of our beautiful drywall and mud and stuff. i'm sure all the pictures will look similar to you (all the rooms are mostly covered in white now - all the bedroom walls were kind of horrific after pulling all the wallpaper, panelling, and glass square crap down so they patched them all up), but they look absolutely wonderful to us :)

and one of my personal favorites...

he loves that i take so many pictures. clearly.

too early?

it seems around this time of year, you belong to one side or the other -- either you are a Christmas fanatic and start listening to FM100's 24/7 Christmas music as soon as you put away your Halloween costume, or you like to enjoy your holidays, each and every one, and practically protest anything Christmas until after Thanksgiving.

i can't really say i'm either, honestly. although i do really enjoy Thanksgiving and don't want to just run right over it with jingle bells, i sometimes have a hard time changing the station when a fun Christmas song comes on the radio or i see the Christmas aisle at the store. sooo i guess there's also some inbetween's like me. only a few.

so anyway, i've been conjuring up a little list of wishes for Christmas {even though Jae and i already bought ourselves our Christmas present - a new bed set complete with comforter and sheets and the whole shabang...oh yeah...and a new house that we've totally re-done}. and of course, as i'm writing this, i'm remembering the post i wrote just a few days ago about remembering what's important and being grateful for what i have...but everyone can have wishes still, right?? so consider this sincerely just a wish list. 

**Hunger Games series (i borrowed them all when i read them)

**Japanese Cherry Blossom lotion (it just smells soo good)

**Dansko's (either in black, gray, or red...i'm undecided)

**Infinity scarves (i just love them the best)

have you thought about your wishlist yet? or are you being a

grinch until november 25th? ;)

bragging rights

so some of the ladies from work participate in a biggest loser challenge. this is the second time they've done it (it usually coincides with the season on tv). i sorta, half-participated last time, but this time i'm a little more involved. we do weekly weigh-ins and the whole shabang.

well, wednesdays are our weigh-in days, and guess who was the biggest loser of this past week???

you guessed it....ME!!! {said as i'm currently eating a tootsie roll....clearly gave me lots of motivation...}


i am down a whole 6 pounds from last week. i saw the number and thought it must be some sort of fluke. the scale must be broken. but sure enough, the numbers weren't lyin.

that's all really. just wanted to brag about being biggest loser for the week. and 6 pounds? that's pretty good, right? especially considering my exercise largely totally consists of working at our house. not actually making it to the gym. but whatever, i'll take what i can get!

we shall see what the scale has to say next week.

november

so it kind of just hit me....

it's november.

wowza! another year, almost over. it's so strange to me how in the moment, time doesn't seem to be moving {often times those moments are while i'm at work, of course}. every monday i think oh man, it's only monday. yet, on sunday evenings, i think, gosh, it's already almost monday again.

time is a funny thing.

even though some minutes, hours, days seem to draaaag by so slowly, the weeks seem to fly by. and all of a sudden, i realize {a week into the month} that it's already november again.

last year i did a daily "i'm thankful for.." thing on my blog. i thought that would probably be a good thing to make a yearly tradition. i get so caught up in every-day life, i forget the small & simples of life. i forget why we're here and what's most important. well, now that it's the 8th of november, i obviously am not doing my daily "thankful's", but i want to make sure i keep the right frame of mind, nonetheless.

so it might not be every day, but i need to express my thanks. i need to remember to not take things for granted. i need to not be judgemental. i need to be happy & healthy. i need to surround myself with good things. i need to look on the bright side - see the glass half full. i need to love with all my heart & show that love every day.

and this is the perfect place to do it. this blog acts as a journal, in more ways than not. i'm not much of a writer, and i'm not great with words, but i want to make sure i write things down to remember and be able to look back on and learn from {again}.

i'm excited for the months ahead. i'm excited for the seasons to change, excited for seeing family more often, excited to spend time with Jae. and i'm excited for growing and learning, both mentally and spiritually.

what are your thoughts as we enter these last few weeks of the year?