Halloween

Yay for Halloween!! For some reason I really like this holiday:) I don't know why since I don't like the fact that it's apparently an evil holiday and I don't even really like candy all that much BUT I do like dressing up and pumpkins so I guess it evens out. 

Peter Pan, Tiger Lily, 50s boy, 50s girl, Mary Poppins, Chimney Sweep

Captain America and his assistant

This year for halloween we had a party!  It all started on Saturday night when I got off work at 5 and came home to Skyler who had completely converted our apartment into a haunted apartmet.  He put spider webs everywhere, had made homemade root beer that was bubbly out the sides like a witches cauldron, and used his Boise state shirts to put over the lights so the lighting was all orange.  I love that Skyler gets into holidays:)

People started coming over at 5:30.  We had pumpkin shaped pizzas, a pumpkin carving contest(prizes included that Sky had picked out), a costume contest, and after we went to the corn maze. It was a really fun night and I loved that everyone got in to dressing up.

Also, in the spirit of Halloween I had a party with my two clogging dance classes.  We played "Trick or Treat" where they either picked a treat or had to do a clogging trick.  It was really fun and I loved seeing them all dressed up :)

Skyler makes me so proud!!

On Saturday, September 17th Skyler ran his first marathon!  He ran it in 3 hrs and 33mins and got 19th in his age group.  My dad also ran it and got the same time. I was so glad that they got to run it together:)  While Skyler was busy running through insane rain, hail, thunder, and lightning I had a really fun time with the Smedley's:)

We started off the day with a good ol' McDonald's breakfast.  After that, we headed to where the runners came out of the canyon at mile 14.  At that mile, Skyler and dad were looking as chipper as ever, haha.  Skyler, all soaking wet, ran right into me and gave me a big dripping hug.  By the time they had passed us, we were one hundred percent drenched!!

We dragged our drenched rear ends back into the car and realized that soaking wet feet would not do, especially with Kerry's diabetes.  Because of that, we went to Payless!!  We went just to get Kerry some new shoes, but we all walked out of the store with some good looking dry feet:)  I LOVE the shoes that I got, they're super cute and feel like slippers:) 

Once we had dry feet, we headed to the finish line!  We stood at the corner that the runners turn and see the finish line for the first time.  It's my favorite thing because people either need a huge cheer to get them going or they are ecstatic.  The Smedley's and I stood there with my sparkly posters that I had made for dad, Skyler, Kelly, and Eric and cheered them on as they finished.

The Guys coming around the corner.

After the race, the guys soaked in the ice cold drainage water and we headed to Maddox!!  It was delicious and so fun to be with everyone.  All together it was a great day. It was so fun to be there with the Smedley's and I am so proud of my family:)

Becoming one with nature

Growing up, Heather (my cousin) and I would always run towards each other, wrap our right legs around ourselves and say "we are one."  That is exactly what Skyler and I did with nature this past weekend.  We ran towards it, wrapped our legs around it, and said "we are one." haha

Ok, all jokes aside, Skyler and I went CAMPING for the first time together.  On a Thursday our neighbors text us randomly and asked if we wanted to go the next night camping and we said sure!  We have a tent and we figured that was really all we needed because we could figure everything else out.  So we borrowed some sleeping bags and chairs, made tin foil dinners, and packed nothing but an extra sweatshirt to put on at night.

This was our site!  I thought it was really beautiful.

Here's Sky doing his manly role of checking the dinners.

Luckily it worked out pretty well for us.  The couple that we went with has been married for 3 years, so in our newly wed eyes, they were pros.  Things that they brought that we didn't even think of was:  toilet paper, wet wipes, a lantern, and tongs (to rotate the foil dinners).  Let's just say we were glad they were there.

We got to our spot around 5:00, set up camp, and started making the dinners right away.  Our tent went up pretty quick luckily;  we had never seen it but apparently the $20 special at Bed Bath and Beyond looks like a space ship that you could use as a solar tanning bed.  We thought it was pretty funny but it worked:)

Our tent is the one on the right side

The truth is, it went pretty smoothly.  I only went to the bathroom once in the 14 hour period that we were there and that worked out great!  At night, we roasted s'mores, talked for quite awhile, and went to bed.  The funniest part was that in the morning I had to be to work by 9 so we packed up early and went to McDonald's. haha It was funny but it just worked out best for us.  All in all our first camping experience was a great success.  I look forward to going more often!

Yum!  We had marinated chicken with potatoes and zucchini and squash.

The Goon!!

Skyler and I went with all of his extended family from Kenra's side to "not quite the happiest place on earth," but somewhere that gives a close second called(according to 4 yr. old Adeline) "The Goon;" known to everyone else in the world as Lagoon.  Where Skyler spent his childhood going to Lagoon, this was my first time, and I definitely was not disappointed:)

This is little miss Adeline that enjoyed being as close to me as possible at all times:)

I think my favorite story from Lagoon was when we went on The Sky Ride. It's a ride that functions like a ski lift but is used to go from one end of the park to the other without walking. Little miss Adeline insisted on going with me.  Justus wanted to go as well and I of course could not resist his big blue eyes asking to go with me.  Therefore, I was standing in line with Adeline on my hip and Justus holding my hand.  As we were waiting in line, Justus looked up at me with his previously mentioned big blue eyes and said, "will you please pick me up to get on the ride, my mom always picks me up."  I said of course I will even though I was secretly not sure how on earth I would manage detaching Adeline onto the charging seat and lift Justus onto it at the same time.  As I attempted to come up with a game plan, I instead submitted to the game plan of just winging it, because no matter what I thought of, I knew it would not work out.

Here are the two love birds on The Sky Ride, my in-laws.

The line slowly shortened and sooner than I wanted, we were standing on the yellow line as the evil metal chair swung around the corner and headed right towards us.  My first instinct was to swing my right shoulder back(that Adeline was attached to) and attempt to detach her.  There is where my plan failed; detaching Adeline was not about to happen.  Instead I kept her attached with regrets of having wasted my precious few seconds trying and attempted to pick up 6 year old Justus while the metal chair was slowly, yet quickly taking him out from the waist down.  As he desperately looked up at me and pedaled his feet as fast as he could I was fortunate enough to swoop him up and plant all of our tooshes on the chair on literally the last milisecond.  Even though that was the result, it didn't mean they didn't need to stop the whole sky lift and slightly embarass me. 

Now, you have to realize that by now I'm completely frazzled and just relieved that both of the children made it onto the lift successfully.  But, that was not what was going on in Justus' head.  After being on the lift for about 30 seconds Justus looked up at me with his eyes and said in a quivery voice "you promised me!  You said that you would pick me up and you didn't."  It was at that moment that I knew I had failed.  I felt absolutely terrible.  Luckily Justus was understanding because he then said "It's ok, I understand that you had to help Adeline too."  He was so cute about it but I still felt terrible. 

I know I didn't mention this before but, I actually don't really like this ride.  My fingers usually get really tingly because of the height and I really have to try to not think about how I could potentially fall and die.  With my fear, Adeline conveniently decided to start talking about how we were going to fall off the ride and crack our skulls open.  Meanwhile, out of nowhere Justus decided he wanted to say more than 5 words to me at a time.  So on my right side I have Adeline telling me we're going to die and I have no idea what Justus was saying because I was too destraught about what Adeline was saying, but don't worry, they were both have a complete conversation with me separate from eachother.


This story, although starting with a failure, did end successfully, I was able to hoist both children off and we ran off to our victory.  Will I ever take 2 children on that ride by myself again? No! haha it was actually a pretty funny adventure and made for a good memory but I was not thinking those things while it was happening.  But,  i definitely can't wait to go back to Lagoon again!

Oh what Sky and I would do for some extra money...

As I was folding up hundreds of grey satin sashes last night at about 11 at night, it hit me that Skyler and I have some pretty random jobs that we do in order to bring in some extra money.  Especially since Sky has been on his 7-week summer break, he has been more than willing to do some jobs where he can.  Here is a list of jobs that Either Skyler or I have done for extra money, starting with the most normal ones first:


1.  I work at the hospital in the Physical Therapy department.  I work there about 20-30 hours a week, and my job includes assisting in wound care, helping people through their exercises, hooking patients up on electrical stimulation, and doing ultrasounds.

2.  I also work at a store called The Circle of Love.  This is a full service bridal shop where we sell suits, tuxes, church cloths, prom dresses, homecoming dresses, and wedding gowns.  Basically I do anything to sell those things, organize, or fix those things:)

3.  Skyler works as a student secretary in the religion department on campus.  Every semester he is assigned to certain religion teachers and he helps them stay organized.  He grades papers, organizes their work load, and does anything else they might need.

4.  I teach dance classes.  I teach a jazz class that has three girls in it around the age of 10.  I also teach a private jazz lesson with a 16 year old.  And I teach a tots beginner clogging class that contains 18 students!!

5.  Skyler, during the summer break was asked to paint our neighbors apartment; one couple moved out and they had a week to get the apartment ready for the next couple.  So Skyler, scrubbed and painted a two bedroom apartment, which took him 41 hours and in return we got free rent for a month:)

6.  Skyler and I help take down wedding receptions.  There is a wedding decorator here in town named Sally who sets up some AMAZING receptions.  After the reception, she hires young married couples to take down the decorations.  She pays 10 dollars an hour so as a couple you can make about 40 to 60 bucks a night, which is great!

7.  Skyler helps a caterer in town.  Her name is Daila and she can't take heavy things up and down stairs.  Therefore she pays Skyler $60 a day to carry things up in the afternoon (takes about 15 mins) and to carry things down in the evening (another 15 mins).

8.  We have also been asked several times to house sit.  We once house sat a place for 6 months while a couple was living in Florida, their mansion was quite the task.  We also plant sit (miserably).

Between all of these jobs we are lucky enough to not only survive through our first few years of marriage but we are lucky enough to save some money each month.  We also stay pretty darn busy to say the least, but we wouldn't have it any other way:)

Because of the Smedley's.....

One of the things I worried most about before Skyler and I got married was money.  I wasn't sure how it would be possible for us to pay to even live.  Fortunately since then I have come to my senses and realized that it's not really all that bad when I work full time and skyler works as well.  BUT I have to say that "Because of the Smedley's" we not only survive but we thrive thanks to Kenra's abilities to get an insane deal wherever she goes.

Everytime we visit Meridian, we take a trip to "the store"....and I'm not talking Wal-mart, Target, or Albertson's.  I'm talking, The Smedley's pantry!!  In the Smedley's pantry you will find anything from cereal to tampons to batteries. And as Wal-mart would say, it's "Low Prices Guaranteed!" 

The shopping experience usually begins with you taking what you think is reasonable without being too greedy, followed by Kenra coming in and picking out 10 more bags of things and secretly loading them into your car:) 

 "Because of the Smedley's" we've been lucky to have not bought any of the following since we've been married:  toothpaste, toothbrushes, deoderant, shampoo, conditioner, toilet paper, razors, shaving cream....etc. In other words, we are extremely blessed to have the Smedley's be so kind and generous to us.  So here's to the Smedley's and their pantry:)  Thank you!!

This is the storage that we have in our apartment "Because of the Smedley's"

Meet the Smedley's

Once upon a time there was a precious girl with hazel eyes and brown hair who dreamed of one day meeting her prince charming, getting married, and dancing through life.

MEANWHILE.....   
                    
There was a young boy with rosy cheeks, toe head curls, and blue eyes who one day dreamed of becoming a dentist and playing football through life.

They're lives crashed into each other in January 2010 and have never been separated since.  Skyler and I were married on December 18, 2010 and since then, I continue to live in my fairytale and Skyler continues to be my prince charming while working as hard as he possibly can to one day become a dentist.
                               
MEANWHILE....

Skyler goes to school and work from 7am to 6 pm everyday and I work on average about 53 hours a week between being a physical therapy tech and employee of The Circle of Love (bridal and tux shop).  We live in a 100 year old building that is attached to a ballroom, mattress store, and chiropractic office.  We teach the 12 and 13 year old youth Sunday School class at church and we go to Kiwi Loco (frozen yogurt shop) about once a week.  Life isn't easy, but life is good:)