Happy New Year!

I may be part of the unpopular opinion, but I really don't like the new year.  The new year involves a lot of reflection for all.  And for me, I don't get down because of the unreached goals, the broken would have's or useless should have's.  I don't like the new year because I reflect on all the great things that happened in the year, and why would I want to leave that?  I think back to the past year and I feel like nothing could ever be better than it is right now.

A year ago, I had just gotten engaged to my best friend and was looking at 2014 with bright eyes.  It was sure to be the best year ever, and I wanted to savor every minute of it.

But I blinked and all of a sudden I was experiencing the best day of my life.  It was my wedding day and all my family and friends were around and I was married to my best friend and ready to face any and all challenges that came our way!  We celebrated in California and then went on the best honeymoon ever!  I wanted to freeze time and relive those 10 days over and over again.

Family + Friends at the temple

Our faces after we finished parasailing on Catalina Island.

Matching t-shirts and happy faces at Disneyland!

But the days and months marched on and all of a sudden the summer was over, and I was on a plane heading back to Hawaii for what was surely to be the most exciting, hard, crazy adventure yet!  I didn't want to let the summer (or my family and Utah life) go!

"our" new puppy!

Puppy naps with Ellie!

24th of July Fireworks

But I blinked again, and it was Christmas.  It was a year of firsts! Our first apartment, our first few tough situations (who knew marriage was hard?! ;)  ), our first Thanksgiving, our first birthday celebrations together, our first Thanksgiving, and now Christmas.  Only another week and it would be the new year!

Smiles at Carissa's wedding

The birthday boy!

Our Thanksgiving decoration

temple trip!

Our first Christmas tree

And that week passed.  So here I am thinking about 2014.  I laughed, I cried (probably more than I should have), I was sad and scared, I was angry and frustrated, and I was happy and excited.  I wonder how anything could be as good as 2014, but then again, I've said that ever year.

So, I'm facing 2015 with a solid amount of hope (and a bit of fear of the unknown) that it will be as good as the years past! Here's to you 2015!  Let's see what you bring. :)

We survived 2014!

Deck the Halls!

Welp!  Halloween is over, November is officially here, and I can't wait for Christmas.  Yes, I am one of "those" people.  I feel like there are 3 types of people in this situation.

1 -  The Christmas Enthusiast.  People like myself.  People who listen to Christmas music at the stroke of midnight on Halloween, when it's officially November 1st.  People who don't get sick of the endless Christmas music and Christmas movies even after Christmas has past.

2-  The People Who are Ok With It.  These are the people who tolerate the Christmas Enthusiasts aka me.  They roll their eyes but put up with the Christmas music but ask that you (I) put headphones in while you (I) listen to it.  But they're generally ok with it.

3 - The Thanksgiving Enthusiast.  These are people who demand Thanksgiving be recognized.  There is a strict no Christmas music or Christmas anything until after Thanksgiving.  They are the Thanksgiving crusaders!  

I get all types of these people.  My Dad and my husband are very much Thanksgiving Enthusiast types.  Which is great!  

But, this is about why I'm a Christmas Enthusiast.  

Why do I start celebrating Christmas on November 1st?  Because I love it.  I love Christmas.  I love pretty much everything about it.  Mostly, I love the holiday season.  If there were plenty of Thanksgiving songs, you bet your bottom dollar, I'd be singing them.  But, there aren't that many.  (The only one I can think of is "Go Tell Aunt Rhody"...and we weren't allowed to sing that in my house.  haha.  SO!  If you find good ones, send them my way.)

But mostly it's about the holiday spirit.  The sense of gratitude, service, love, family, and all around joy.  The REAL Christmas Spirit.  What the Spirit of Christmas should be.  We should be able to have that all 365 days of the year, not just for a single month!  So I'll start singing early.  I'm going to readopt all the feelings of what Christmas is about starting...yesterday.  
So Deck the Halls, and get ready for all the holiday cheer.  
Because Halloween is over, November is officially here, and I CAN'T WAIT FOR CHRISTMAS!

There's No Place Like Home

Well the hubby and I made a whirlwind trip to California last weekend for his sisters wedding!  And boy, what a week it was.

I started a new job nannying four little rascals last Monday.  I look after a 2 month old baby girl, a year and a half year old boy, a three and a half year old boy, and a six and a half year old boy from 7 AM to 3 PM.  (I don't know about some people, but 6:30 AM is real early for me.)  The oldest one is at school most of the day I'm there so it's just me and the three little ones.  And it's a zoo.  But they are all adorable so it makes it worth it.

We fed the Sister missionaries on Tuesday night.  It was a crazy day.  We did laundry and fed the missionaries all in one night!  I love having the missionaries in our home!  It's such wonderful thing.  They brought such a sweet spirit into our home it was lovely.  For that whole hour I forgot about the trillion things I had to do that week.

On top of going out of town Friday morning, I had to plan some music things for stake conference, Nathan was busy with school, homework, tests, his wife, work, and everything else, AND we had cleaning checks Saturday on our kitchens and bathrooms so we had to deep clean before we left.

Wednesday was spent cleaning the kitchen and attempting to catch up on sleep.  I know me.  I could already feel a cold coming on.  My body was so exhausted but I didn't have a choice but to keep on pushing through.  I could die on the plane, or in California, that's closer to Utah than here in Hawaii!

Thursday I didn't have any energy left.  I was sick and tired of being sick and tired.  So I did a little cleaning and slept!  I didn't even bother to pack.  haha.  Thank goodness for my rock star husband.  I woke up so sick Friday morning I could hardly move and had no desire to finish my cleaning or pack my stuff.  So my wonderful husband cleaned and did about 10 million other things while I slept, showered, and packed.

We hopped a plane Friday morning and headed out ready to embrace our quick trip to California!  We landed around 10:00 PM, tired and hungry but safe.  After some insane traffic circumstances we finally got to the place we were staying for the weekend around 1:00 AM.  Even though I had a raging fever, the cold medicine and In N Out in my stomach made for a solid night of sleep.

Saturday I woke up still sicker than a dog.  I was grateful the wedding wasn't until 3 PM and how gracious everyone else was with letting me sleep and relax a bit.  I took that cold medicine and cough drops like my life depended on it.  Mostly because it did.  

But 3 PM rolled around and we were all ready to go!  It was a beautiful wedding!  It was a country chic themed wedding in a barn!  It was so cool. Everything looked amazing.  Nate's sister, Carissa, looked so beautiful.  A bunch of family and friends were there and it made for a wonderful day!  We played games, we danced, we just enjoyed ourselves!  I almost forgot I was sick, until about 9:30 rolled around and I was ready to hit the hay.  (This is the part where you laugh.  Barn...hay...haha)

And just like that, in a blink of an eye, we were back on a plane headed home to Hawaii.  We were exhausted, but just happy to be together.  And so happy to have had the opportunity to even come and be a part of the wedding and be with family and friends.  It was a bittersweet goodbye, as always.  We made up for it on the plane though.  We just started playing with Photo Booth on the plane.  I'm sure everyone around us thought we were insane, but we had a good time!  Here are some pictures for a good laugh.  

These show just how crazy we really felt after our whirlwind trip!  

Even after we got home, we were so crazy, we couldn't help but take a few more.

This is the look on our faces when we actually saw ourselves. ;)

After all that, I'm glad we're not taking anymore whirlwind trips to the mainland for a while.  I think we'll just relax on the beach for Halloween. ;)

A Letter to "Stephanie"

Dear "Stephanie",

I don't know who you are...but the random people who keep calling me from all across the United States are looking for you.  I don't think they are important people.  They're mostly telemarketers or recordings of telemarketers.  

I'd like to think that you just got your phone number wrong when you gave it out to whoever you did.  I really hope you just didn't put down some random phone number, because it didn't turn out to be random.  It turned out to be mine.  Whoever you gave it to, gave it to about a thousand other people.

Wanna know what's even worse?  The time difference!  Little did you know that incorrect phone number belonged to someone who lived in HAWAII.  No one likes being woken up at 4 AM every hour till 7 AM to a phone number they don't know, just to have it be a telemarketer looking for someone who isn't even you.  And oh how I wish it was from the same place!  That way I could just block it or ignore it, but it never is.  Maryland to Arizona.  New York to Washington state.  California to Virginia.

So "Stephanie", I'll continue to ignore the calls or tell them they have the wrong number.  You're welcome.

Sincerely,

I'M NOT STEPHANIE

So This is Love

DISCLAIMER:   This post is cheesy.  But worth it in my opinon

I realized something the other day.  One morning, Nate was getting up to go to class and I wasn't having the best morning.  I was sick, sleep deprived, and I was feeling really clingy.  Lucky for me, my husband doesn't 100% hate clingy.  While I begged and pleaded for him not to go to class (which...is not a good idea, mind you), he got dressed and ready to leave for class anyway.  As I rolled over to try and go back to sleep, feeling really grumpy, I felt him climb back in bed and snuggle up to me.  "5 minutes" he said, as he kissed my cheek and snuggled closer.  When our five minutes of extra morning cuddles was up, he got back out of bed and left for class.  

That's when the thought occurred to me:  True love is made up of the little things.  

Things like your husband not doing his hair before class to you extra morning cuddles! (As previously posted on Facebook. haha)  And ever since then I've been thinking of all the "little things" that have happened in our short 5 months of marriage.  

So here's a list of the "little things":

True love is your husband driving to come get you after work, because you just don't feel like taking the bus for an hour that day.
True love is your husband coming to eat lunch with you at your work, even if it is only to use the microwave at your office.
True love is your husband doing laundry, and you mowing the lawn, and being totally ok with that.
True love is your husband learning to mow the lawn, because he's never had to do it before.
True love is your husband being better at mowing the lawn than you.
True love is your husband taking you shopping to get rid of your "puppy" anxiety. 
(Long story short: puppy coming home, I was restless.  Solution: SHOPPING)

True love is your husband giving you a kiss when he gets out of bed in the morning, even if you're still sleeping.

True love is your husband doing the dishes because you don't feel like it.
True love is your husband going to fill water bottles at the school because your tap water is gross.

True love is your husband killing bugs all over your apartment because A- you don't want to and B- they are gross.

True love is your husband making dinner with you.
True love is your husband making you pancakes just because.
True love is your husband making bacon with 5/7 meals during the week, and being enthusiastic about it. 
True love is your husband not judging you, if all you want to eat is mashed potatoes for dinner.
True love is your husband finding another solution for a healthier dinner that also involves mashed potatoes.
True love is your husband making cinnamon rolls with you again even though it's hard, time consuming, and the both of you secretly don't really want to.
 True love is your husband playing "Rock, Paper, Scissors" with you when you can't remember whose day it is to pray. (Loser prays)
True love is your husband saying the prayer anyways, even though he won fair and square.

True love is your husband not getting sick of your endless Disney knowledge.
True love is your husband actually being impressed that you know all the lyrics to most Disney songs.

True love is your husband not getting sick of you randomly breaking into song, whether your singing voice sounds good or not that day.
True love is your husband listening to you sing "Truly Scrumptious" as a love song to him.
True love is your husband admitting he hates the word "scrumptious" even after you just sang it like 10 times.
True love is your husband saying he likes your singing anyways.

True love is your husband being better at quoting movies than you.
True love is your husband watching Dr. Who reruns on Netflix because you want to.
True love is your husband judging couples on the Amazing Race with you and deciding who to root for. (Or against.)

I know it seems like a lot.  But I'm sure there are THOUSANDS of "little things" I'm not noticing.  So while Nathan continues to drive in the fast lane, I'll just sit in the passenger seat and notice as many "little things" as possible.

The Best Day of My Life

Well, for anyone who's interested, here's the story of the best wedding day of all time.

(Preface:  Just a small shout out and thanks to everyone in my life who made my wedding day the best and easiest thing in the world.  I'm lucky enough to know people who took photos, decorated spaces, got flowers, and made our cake for us and with our best in their hearts.  This day wouldn't have been perfect if it wasn't for those people.  You know you are. ;) xoxoxo)

It started off early.  Really early.  I was tired because I should've gone to bed earlier.  Not that it would've mattered, I didn't really sleep anyways.  6:00 AM came with excited, anxious jitters for the day ahead.  Megan and Tilo came by to finish off my hair and bringing my future husband with them.  The amount of butterflies in my stomach from seeing Nathan on the day of the wedding almost made it hard to eat the breakfast he had made.  But who can resist a man who cooks for you and your friends?

11:30 AM came too quickly and we rushed out of the house ready to face the day ahead.  The schedule called for non-stop wedding action until 9:00 PM at night.  I was constantly crossing my fingers that nothing would go wrong.  We didn't have much wiggle room.  

The opportunity to go through the temple and be sealed for time and all eternity was a moment I will never forget.  As the two of us sat in the celestial room waiting to meet with our sealers I couldn't stop smiling.  This was it!  This was the day that I had been waiting for since I was old enough to understand what Happily Ever After was!  And I was lucky enough to have found my prince charming sitting right next to me, loving me and always treating me like a princess.  (Sorry for the sappiness, but it's true).  Walking into the sealing room surrounded by friends and family and the love of my life truly was a little piece of heaven.  

After the sealing, I changed into my wedding dress a married woman!  Everything was perfect.  Outside of the temple were all our friends and family waiting to greet and congratulate us.  It was so fun!  Words cannot describe how grateful I was to all the people who came to see us.  We had friends  cross oceans and states to come celebrate with us.  It was amazing.  One of my favorite things was the missionary cut out my family got of my brother.  He wasn't a huge fan of the idea, but I'm glad he's in the photos.  Plus, my friends had WAY too much fun carrying him around from the temple to the luncheon and at the reception.

After more photos and video footage we were whisked away to the luncheon.  Delicious Italian food, a classy environment, friends and family and endless Diet Coke is basically what my own slice of paradise would look like!  And that's exactly what I got.  All of our friends sat at our head table which was lovely.  It gave Nate and me the chance to hang out with our friends that we haven't seen in a long time, and it was so perfect.  

After the luncheon we took a small break, checked into our hotel, and went to the Ivy House where our reception was held.  (And when I say small break, I mean REALLY SMALL.  We only had time to check in, drop off our bags, hit the bathroom, and run back to the car to get to the reception.  Nothing else. ;)  )   

The reception hall was set up and decorated beautiful.  It was a gorgeous space on it's own and adding our own little flare made my the image inside my head translate to reality.  It was perfect.  We took even more photos and got ready for the reception.  The amount of people that showed up made us feel so very loved.  The outpouring of support as we started our life together definitely made us feel special.  

We tossed a bouquet, I did a surprise hula, we cut the cake (I got it smashed in my face), and we danced until no one wanted to anymore.  (Which wasn't very long. lol)  As we headed out to a sparkler and (surprise) silly string send off, I couldn't have wished for a better day.  If I could pick one day in my life to relive over and over again, it would definitely have been this one. 

This is my life now.  There's 2 of us which means I'm driving in the carpool lane.  Or at least Nathan's driving and I'm sitting very comfortable in the passenger seat, soaking up the fast lane.

All by Myself

To most who know me, it's no surprise that I like to do things with people.  When a social opportunity presents itself, I'll most likely accept.  But there usually is a condition. 

That condition is this: DON'T MAKE ME GO BY MYSELF! 
The most reliable person I know could guarantee that they would meet me at said hypothetical social gathering at a specific time in a specific place, and I'd still suggest/beg that we go together.  There's this fear that if I go by myself, they won't actually be there.  Or that I'd be early, or they'd be late.  The fear that at some point in time I would be by myself, I wouldn't know anyone, and it would be awkward.  And that just can't happen.   Most of the time if I have to choose between going alone with the potential of meeting up with people I know or sitting at home, I'd end up at home on my couch...alone.  My fear of being alone in a social situation is literally that much greater than my fear of missing out. 

But I promise this post isn't about my sad reliance on other people.  Keep going. :)

With my fear of going places alone sort of explained, can you imagine my anxiety when I couldn't find anyone to go to Comic Con Fan X with?  This had to be my biggest FOMO/Fear of being alone debate to date.  I had been excited for MONTHS about going to Fan X.  Every guest announcement, event announcement, and facebook post made me more and more excited.  I had saved money for months in order to splurge on this, sure to be, expensive event.  It was all going to be SO worth it.  But would it be worth it if I didn't have anyone to share the experience with?

A week before the event and I still didn't have tickets because I still didn't have anyone to go with.  I almost talked myself out of going all together.  Until one morning I read an article on Buzzfeed about things you should do by yourself. It was a silly list, but it struck a chord with me.  I had never done any of these things by myself.  Go out to eat, take a trip, go shopping, go to the beach!  I'd always had someone to go with me.  So I bought tickets and made a commitment - I was going to go to Fan-X all by myself, and I was going to have a good time.

The day came and I was still nervous about going by myself.  But I walked down the street, boarded the bus and headed to the Salt Palace for Fan-X.  On the bus ride there, I wanted to turn back.  I wasn't sure if I could do this.  I walked to the Salt Palace, stood in line with the hundreds of people to get their passes, and had an epiphany.  I wanted to be there!  With or without someone there, I was having a good time just standing in line!  I was excited!  So I got my pass, inside I went, and the fun began.

I went to panels, met celebrities, took tons of pictures, and had a great time BY MYSELF!  It was a miracle!  By the end of the day, my feet hurt from being on them all day, I was tired, my bank account had taken a severe hit, and I was happy.  So so happy!  I couldn't wait to tell my parents and my boyfriend about my adventures.  And at the end of the day, I had another epiphany.

As much fun as I had, I would've had more fun if someone else was there with me.

That's my lesson learned.  I now know I can do things by myself and I won't let my fear of missing out rule my life.  But if I have someone else there to share my adventures with, I know that will make me happier too.  It's no longer about having someone there that I rely on in order to have fun, it's about having someone there to share those fun moments with.

I like driving in the carpool lane.  But I'm glad to know I can drive in the single lane, all by myself.

Because I'm a cliche

Guess what?  I'm a total cliché.  It's no surprise really.  Now that I'm married I've found a new drive to blog about my life.  Things are happening and they're exciting and fun!  And what better way to share them with people and remember the memories than blogging, right?  So I'm going to give this another go.  Wish me luck.