Valentine's 2014

I almost forgot to make a gift for the nephews this year. I looked on Pinterest for something I could throw together real quick. I decided to do a toy shovel with candy and a sign that said "I DIG YOU." I spent my breaks on Monday trying to find sand toys in town, but they haven't stocked those yet. So I looked on Amazon. First, I found some that came with a bucket, but then I found a smaller version. The smaller version came with a set of 12 at half the price it would cost to get 4 bigger ones. I decided to go with the smaller ones and fill them with home made pudding. Than I bought some gummy worms to include with it.

I filled the shovel with the worms and wrapped a sandwich bag around it to keep them in place. I also decided to line the pail with a sandwich bag to make cleanup easier.

On Thursday night, we decided to deliver the gifts a day early so Josh could go with me, since he has to work out of town this weekend. I got home from work and made up some home made pudding. I filled the pails and than topped them with crumbled Oreo's.

 

They were a hit!

While were were at Melanie's, Preston made us a Valentine.

I knew they would use the shovels as spoons. ;) A little messy, but I think they loved it.

After Melanie's, we went to see my sister and her boys. They also loved them!

We had plans for Valentine's, but last minute Josh got the opportunity to work in Wyoming. If the weather cooperates, he will get to fly for the Sage Grouse Study. He was pretty excited. Since we just celebrated our Anniversary, I was ok with him being gone for Valentine's. But he made sure I wouldn't feel left out by coming home with roses last night.

When a friend heard Josh was out of town, she invited me over for dinner. It was a blast. We had dinner and than played Uno Robato.

Josh has had the opportunity, a few times now, to fly over Wyoming and look for sage grouse. But every time he'd get ready to go, the pilot would cancel due to the weather. This weekend, he finally got to go. Here's a picture of Wyoming from the air he sent me this morning. 

13th Anniversary

This year marks our 13th Anniversary. It seems like I can't even remember having a life before meeting Josh. I love him so much. 

This year, we decided to go enjoy a relaxing weekend at Lava Hot Springs, Idaho. About a month ago, I started searching online. We finally decided to stay at this little apartment building. It was cheaper than the other hotels and it included a kitchen. (I forgot to take pictures of it.) It was older, but still very cute. We had planned on doing our own cooking, but when the time arrived, we decided to just eat out.

Saturday morning, we went to leave. We got about 10 miles down the road and my car's "check engine" light came on. We decided to turn around and go get the truck instead. Before we could even get home, the light went off. But we decided to play it safe and take the truck anyways. 

When we got to Lava Hot Springs, it was BUSY. Turns out it was their Fire & Ice Winter Fest. I spent all that time online looking at hotels and restaurants and never even noticed. At first, we were kind of mad because we wanted a quite, peaceful weekend. Than we saw a list of events and were mad we didn't know about it before hand. We had missed some fun stuff on Friday and there was a run planned for Sunday, but we didn't have our tennis shoes with us. It was busy, and parking was miserable, but in the end, we decided we want to go again next year. 

There really was no parking in town. We ended up parking a block away from our apartment. But because the town is so small, we decided to just walk everywhere. The first night, we walked up to a pizza parlor. On the way back, they started lighting off fireworks from the mountain side. 

We spent Saturday night at the Hot Springs. Than we went again Sunday morning. That is when they do the Running of the Bulls. Every starts at the other end of main street and races to the Hot Pools, in just their swim suits! It looks cold, but the run is actually pretty short, maybe half a mile. Josh to try it next year. 

Sunday night we went to a fancier place for dinner. (We had to make a reservation online!) We went to the Portneuf Grill & Lounge in the Riverside Inn. By that time, the town was pretty much deserted. For most of dinner, we were the only people there, but a second couple showed up right when we were leaving.

After dinner, we decided to go back to the Hot Pools one last time and ended up staying until they closed. 

We talked about going again on Monday morning, before we left, but I was afraid I wouldn't be able to leave. So we decided to just head home. During the weekend Josh commented how far we had come. When we got married, all we could afford was lunch at the Dairy Keen in Heber. So in honor of our first meal together, as husband and wife, we stopped there on our way home. 

When we got home, I had a fun surprise. My mom had watched our pets for us while we were gone and she left me an early Valentine.

I ended up calling in an IOU on my gift, so I can shop around. I want a wine cooler for our kitchen. But I need to decide where I'm going to put it and how big I want it to be. Our kitchen is pretty small, so I'm still deciding. I would also like to look at them in person instead of just online. 

For Josh, I got him a new leather wallet. He loved it! I've had it since before Christmas, so it was really hard for me to wait this long to give it to him. I almost let the surprise slip a few times. 

He wanted me to get something, so while in Lava Hot Springs, I picked out a pretty flower necklace.

Some days, it feels like we've been married forever (but in a good way). Other days, it feels like not that long. Either way, I'm so grateful he asked me to be his wife all those years ago. 

2014 Resolutions

I almost forgot to blog my New Year's Resolutions this year. Actually, its taken me a while to decide on some.

1- Send cards. This started out as just sending birthday cards to my nephews for their birthday, but I've already had so much fun with it, I'm trying to find more reasons to send cards. I've sent a few "thank you" cards, a "get well" card and "happy birthday" cards to various people.

2- Pay off the car. This was the first time we went with a 4 year loan instead of 3 years. The lower payments were nice, but I'm a little bummed we're still paying on it. The last payment is scheduled for January 2015, but I hope to pay it off by October. Than we plan to try to put the payment money aside for 9 months and have a good down payment for a new truck.

3- I hate to admit it, but I've put a little bit weight back on. I lost 70 pounds total the first time around, but I've put about 25 of that back on. But I'm not going to whine about it. I'm just going to kick butt and loose it again. Josh and I both joined the gym in December. Its been great having an exercise partner this time around. When one of us wants to be lazy and sleep in, the other one is there to motivate the other one. 

4- Eat healthier. When we moved to town, we vowed to not eat out. And we've done very well with that. But now we need to work on eating healthier. We've decided to start everyday with a glowing green smoothie and make sure we have a vegetable with every dinner.

5- Home improvements. First on the list is to plant some sod in the back yard. With all the snow melting it is a muddy mess. I also want to update some of our furniture. I'm still deciding which pieces, but I'm thinking a new dresser, new TV and new TV stand. We don't want to go into debt for any of it, so we'll see how far the cash stretches out over the year.

Preston's 7th Birthday

Last week, my nephew, Preston, turned 7! 

This year, I thought it would be fun to mail out birthday cards so they could get something on their birthday. 

 Of course, I had to add money to make it more fun. Melanie said it arrived on his birthday and he loved it.

He asked me to make him a Mario cake. I did some looking online and found a few ideas. He decided he wanted the Chain Chomp cake. It was just a round cake, so it was simple enough to do. I couldn't decide how to do the chain. In the end, I went with mini chocolate donuts. I cut pieces into them so they would link together. It was a hit!

I also tried to find some fun candles for his cake. Unfortunately, the Mario candle was kind of pricey. So in the end, I got it and some star candles. 

I decided to stick with the Mario theme for his gifts. I got him Mario Yahtzee, Mario Checkers, some Mario stickers for his bedroom and a game cube full of candy. 

I think the Yahtzee game was his favorite. 

I can't believe how big he has gotten. 

Zipprer's Ear

In November, we decided to get Gaby fixed. When we took her in, we also took Zipper. He had developed a sore on his ear and it wasn't getting better. The vet looked at it and said it was most likely a cancer spot; given the fact he is a white cat and they sunburn so easily. He told us to watch it for a few weeks and see what happened. It got rapidly got worse.

Then two weeks ago, I came home from work to find a piece had fallen off, with his ear. So I called the vet and got him an appointment as soon as they could get him in.  Also, the night before his appointment, we felt a sore starting on his other ear. 

Here is a before picture the morning of his surgery. He wasn't happy because we had locked up all the food and water the night before and both cats were convinced they were on the brink of starvation. Until Gaby saw the cat carrier. When Josh put Zipper in it, she was a blur as she ran upstairs and hid under the bed. She did the same thing when I brought him home that afternoon.

  

I went to the vet on my lunch break to see if I could pick him up early. The front desk receptionist thought he was still too sleepy, but then the assistant saw me and told me I could take him now, while he was still to groggy to bite. I think he had let them know his displeasure earlier in the morning and they didn't want to see it again.

They were able to burn the newer sore off of his one ear, but they had to completely cut the bad one out, ear and all. They actually saved more ear than we originally thought; but there's no hiding it, he only has one and 3/4 of an ear now. It seemed tender for a few days, but now he's back to his normal self. We are hopeful they got it all, but we will have to be diligent now to always be checking so we can catch cancer spots sooner and just freeze them off in the future. 

Savannah's 31st Birthday

This year, my birthday fell on a Friday. So I decided to treat myself to a day off from work.

Josh and I like to start the day off with one present, and then save the rest for that night. While I was getting ready that morning, my mom called and offered to take me to lunch. Josh decided which present to give me first since I was going out that day.

A new wallet. I love it.

Each year, he always find the best birthday cards. This year was no exception. 

That afternoon, my mom took me to lunch at Cafe Rio in Vernal. She bought me a tote for scrapbooking supplies and a cute shelf for our new home. 

When I came back from lunch, I found these pretty flowers Josh had bought for me. 

As the day wore on, it just kept getting better and better. That evening, Melanie and the boys came to see me. They brought me balloons and a cute bottle with a flower in it. I LOVED seeing my favorite boys on my birthday and made sure to get a kiss from each of them. 

They even signed their names to the card. 

Gaby also loved the balloons; they came with string. 

  Jessica also came by with a gift. She bought me this cute Pocket Tote from Thirty-One. She had to show me how it works, but I love it!

Dinner was one of my favorites, Chicken Parmesan Wraps and Cranberry Cake. 

After dinner, I opened the rest of my presents.

I feel pretty loved and spoiled. I bought the Wii game for myself (and a fishing one for Josh). 

Josh got me:

new licenses plate covers

a wallet

raspberry sticks

i-tunes card

a book

and a hand held vacuum

First Home Improvement

We spent about a year looking for the perfect house. One of the problems we faced, was everything in our price range, was a fixer upper. We did not want a fixer upper. So when we found our town house, we were just as shocked as everyone that it was the one we fell in love with. But it was the right size, a great location, and in great condition. 

Sure, it has it problems like any other new home purchase. But compared to some we looked at, it was heavenly.

When we made our offer, we knew it would need new sod planted in the back yard. We weren't able to do it last summer, but hope to this year. The thing we failed to notice, was the back gate. We are now pretty sure it was broken before we moved in and the previous own and rigged it. 

Within the first few days of moving in, we learned that the wind whips it horribly. It had broken the latch, knocked a few of the panels loose and it wouldn't stay closed. So we drove a stake into the back of it to help keep it in place. Then, we had to set the dog house in front of the broken panel to keep Sage from getting out. She thought this was her personal peep spot and she loved to look out of it and watch what little she could. 

It was another project we were thinking of leaving for the coming summer. But now, the school district plans to build a new elementary school. I'm still not positive of the exact location, but I know it is either right across the street from us or right next to us (to the south). But when the school bond election passed, I was worried they would start construction, and it would be right across the street where Sage could watch, and bark at them, all day long. She doesn't bark much; only when she notices activity across the street. But I'm pretty sure construction would result in her barking a lot more. 

So I decided we better get our fence fixed now. 

It was hard to find someone. I left several messages with several companies and they never called me back. I'm sure its because they felt my project was too small and not worth their time. But I finally found a guy in Vernal who said he could do it.  He came over the same day I called him to look at it. He even offered to try and fix the one to make it last until the new one was in. 

The longest part was waiting for the parts. He told me to order just my stuff would kill me on shipping, so I agreed to wait until he had a large order to place and he could add my stuff to it.

Last week, he came and replaced our gate. We didn't replace the fence at all, but we did have him add some steal posts to the inside of the corner posts to give it more stability. Then we also had him move the hinges to the other side so that hopefully the wind won't affect it too much. 

Sage won't use her dog house. We thought maybe by moving it closer to the back door she would, but she still won't. Now she sleeps in the dirt spot where her house used to be. She still tries to peak out of the small crack, but I don't think she can see much now. 

I was so excited for our first home improvement that I almost didn't care about the bill. 

I think next on the list is to plant some sod back there. Then the only other big thing we want to do is paint. But since we both despise painting, we'll probably put it off for a few years until we can save up and pay someone else to do it for us.