I Promised Pictures

Friday night, Meg, Tahnee and I went to the American Fork Hospital for the "Girl's Night Out" event. We were so lucky to start the evening off with listening to Stephanie Nielson talk about hope. It was exactly what I needed to hear. Earlier that day, I had been complaining to my ever-so loving husband about how I just don't feel good about how I look and complaining about what us women do best...looks, weight, blah, blah, blah. Then Stephanie talked about how more than 80% of her body had burned in a plane accident and how it took her six months to even look at her own face. Shortly after then is when her four kids came to visit her in the hospital and her oldest daughter took one look at her, looked back at the floor and walked outside. It was a while after that heart breaking experience she would look at her again :( She talked about how it was such a difficult time in her life and that she will continue to have surgeries on her entire body for the rest of her life (most likely). How it took her a long time to accept what she looked like and that the accident happened. But admist all of the horrible things that happened, she talked about how she is so grateful she is alive. That she can zip her kids carrots in zip-lock baggies everyday, that she can watch her kids grow up, that she can hike the Y, that she can be with Mr. Nielson (her husband), and so many other things. One example I thought was really funny, was that they had to take the skin on her scalp and put it on her forehead; she said, "It doesn't even wrinkle! There are blessings that have come with this!" She has a very positive outlook on life NOW. I can relate to her on so many levels. It is really hard going through such life-threatening changes, but looking back on all of my challenges, I can really see the blessings that have come from them.

The rest of the evening we enjoyed free food, ice cream, massages, and other pampering. We received coupons that we look forward to using for other pampering services. We were there from 6-9 pm and it was a blast...and it was FREE!

Friday night, Josh, Meg, and I went and saw the "GLEE" 3D movie. Josh will tell you it was better than he thought. I loved it (of course I was singing to EVERY song). Afterward, we introduced Meg to Golden Spoon. Thank you Groupon!

Saturday, I started my new Pilates class. I for sure thought I'd be the only one who has never taken the class and the most out of shape. Nope. I felt right at home :) My instructor was awesome and I look forward to having this class all semester. Then Josh and I cleaned and took a bunch of stuff to Plato's Closet. $48 baby! That's the most we've ever made there!! Since we had some cash, we decided to treat ourselves to J. Dawg's. I love this place. It is the perfect summer meal...sitting on the grass, under a shaded tree, and enjoying our last Saturday of the summer.



The rest of the day we went to Seven Peaks with Meg. Tahnee and Tyler met up with us later. We ended the night (and kept our musical movie theme going) with "High School Musical 3." Apparently I was a lot more tired than I thought, because I feel asleep (again...real surprise) mid-movie. The last thing I remember hearing was Meg say (laughing), "Is she really asleep?" Sorry...

Josh and I wanted to do something fun today (our last day of summer). After church we went to Temple Square. Josh pointed out how we were just in New York where the church all began and today we were in SLC where the church was established. Pretty cool.

Can you believe my iPhone camera took this pic? It's gorgeous!

Here is my new skirt from Savers (local thrift store). I am going to start shopping at second-hand stores more :)

Tomorrow starts the first day of our last fall semester. This next semester is going to FLY by. Wish us luck!!

Stay tuned for the red pants craze...I joined!

Busy Life

i thought that once josh and i got back to provo, life would start to settle down for us. it has been quite the opposite. every night, we are gone doing something! monday-dinner for taylor's birthday, tuesday-helping meg move, last night-drive in movie with kasey and preston (planet of the apes and captain america), tonight- listening to stephanie nielson with tahnee and meg, tomorrow- date with my hubby to see the new glee movie and golden spoon (thanks to groupon), saturday-seven peaks all day and bbq with friends. in the meantime, we have also been working all day and i started my internship! this week has been so much fun, but so busy. lucky for me, i love when i have a full schedule. i have to take pictures tonight at our girl's night out. stay posted.

one thing after another

this weekend was very unexpected. first of all, meg (josh's younger sister) has been staying with us while she waits to move into the enclave (yep, where me and tahnee met our husbands); so that is why she is in this entire blog post :)

friday night, we all decided to go to the utah county fair. Let's just say, it was no orange county fair. It had about ten food vendors all in a u-shape, a singing competition, enough rides to count on one hand, and a rodeo type of event going on (we didn't have tickets too). let's just say, it was a free fair. meg and i shared a funnel cake (that's all I wanted to get that night). so we order our funnel cake and then we saw someone else who ordered it with strawberries and whipped cream. we handed the cashier $2 more and tell him to put the same on ours. we were so excited to eat this, until we took the first bite and the fantasy ended real quick. the strawberries were disgusting, smashed and squishy. there was juice all over making the funnel cake very soggy. it was so unappetizing. after that, the fair really wasn't even exciting anymore. we walked around a little and then went home. hopefully, the utah state fair will be a lot better! while we were at the fair, our cousin-in-law, shelby called and said that her and her husband, thane (josh's cousin) were bored and wanted to come to utah. they asked to stay at our place and of course said yes. when we got home from the fair, i fell asleep and woke up at midnight when they arrived. we were up til 3 am talking. i can't remember the last time I did that!! meg, shelby, and i had agreed we wanted to get a massage at the local massage school the next morning. 5 hours until wake up time...

i wake everyone up at 8:00 and we head out to lindon for a $12.50-hour-long-massage. i had seen on their facebook page that this weekend was the 2-for-1. we were so excited to get there. we got there and it was pretty empty (unusual) and asked if they're having the deal that day. they said that the post on fb was july 19, not august 19. ugh!! what a bust! me and meg, not having worked all summer, had to decline the normal price of $25. boo :( sorry shelby. once we got home, we talked til 1:00 in the afternoon. i had so much to do and tried cleaning while still socializing with everyone. later that afternoon, we went up to draper to help jordan (josh's other cousin) with a wedding reception she helped decorate. wow, was it eventful! it was so hot outside, we got everything up and ready, and all of a sudden a storm came in. everyone was running like crazy grabbing all the decorations, linens, vases, etc. it started down pouring and the family kept saying, it will blow over and we can take everything back outside. are you insane?? it rained the entire time i was there! jordan handled everything so well and was so calm. she wants to go into the wedding planning business and i think will do a great job at it. that night we decided to hang out once the reception was over, but by that time, we had left and i was asleep (big surprise) when everyone came over. it was late and everyone went their separate ways.

sunday, i made chocolate chip pancakes and thane and shelby left for rexburg. we went to church (at 1:40) and we were so bored haha. this is the first time we have been to church since we left ca. in rs, i held a baby. loved it. sacrament, we kept talking about how we missed the twins. i was so squirmy and didn't know what to do with myself. it seemed that church was five hours! while we were in ca this summer, i kept saying how i don't want kids, blah, blah, blah. josh predicted soon as we got back to our ward, i'd get baby hungry. well, he was right (as much as I hate to admit it). however, we will not be getting off birth control anytime soon, I am feelin' the itch. last night, we skyped with the twins. oh man, we miss them so much. i keep telling my mom to put them on a plane, but nothing will persuade her ;)

that was our eventful weekend (sorry there are no pictures). tonight...dinner at the olive garden for a friends birthday and helping meg move into her new apartment (which is the same apartment I lived in...#216).

dilemma

no, i'm not talking about the one that nelly and kelly rowland had. i'm talking about what i want to do in the future...career path. my major is community health. i love it. i get excited to go to school everyday (which has never happened before). i love the things i am learning and how applicable they are to my own self and for raising a family. but, is that what i want to pursue as a career? i don't know. i told josh, in a recent conversation, that i love being an administrative assistant. it's where i feel so comfortable, it's easy, and i don't mind the office setting. although it is mindless at times and i will be qualified to do so much more, i still find myself really enjoying that setting. so i have thought of other things that are along those lines but a step up, something to challenge me a little and something new. human resources. are there any thoughts? are there cons that i should be aware of? i would love to have a little job at the gap, anthro, or j. crew, simply for discounts, but when it comes to making money, i need something a bit more advanced. if there are other suggestions, feel free to let me know :)

new, new, new

obviously i have a lot of activity right now online. i have a lot of spare time at work and, finally, to myself! this is the start of a new...year? some new things going on...

• new school year
• new commitment to plan and grocery shop for at least the next two weeks (done and done)
• new blog title (really...are you shocked? don't be fooled by the period on our tab)

• new building at uvu where all my classes are going to be
• new habits to form (no excessive shopping, hardly eating out, save money to the best of our ability)
• (no) new job for josh...he got his previous job back (hooray!)
• new obsession of pinterest
  
• new career choices i am exploring
• new job josh has to look forward to starting next year
  

1 Year Pics

Back to life, Back to reality

I am now learning how hard it is to get back in the swing of things...meaning, blogging. After some extensive blog stalking (you know you do it too), I decided it's time I update the Whitmore blog and fill everyone in on what Josh and I have been up too.

Right now, Josh and I are back in Happy Valley. We won't be going anywhere for a while. It's nice to finally have our own drawers and walk-in closet. I love my condo and am going to be so sad when I have to leave for good. Last night, after dinner, Josh and I just sat and watched TV...alone. It was so quiet and maybe a bit uneventful haha. But it's nice to just be together-the two of us- and be back to our old lives.

We had a great experience in California this summer. Living with my parents was great and much better than we anticipated. You never know what to expect in situations like that, and ours was wonderful. They moved five houses down, which gave us our own bedroom with attached bathroom downstairs. I mainly focused on the twins, taking them to class and our frequent (more like daily) trips to Mission Mall and Irvine Spectrum to see the puppies and play in the water fountains. I would occasionally take Gracee and Gregory to the pool and of course everyone went to get ice cream (I'm not even going to mention how often we did that).


It was a very emotional good-bye for me and the babies. I couldn't stop crying. I miss them so much, I can't even stand it. But I honestly think I can only do two or three (at the most) kids. I just don't have the energy like my mother does. I was falling asleep at like 7:00 every night this summer.


Josh and I ended up going to Disneyland every Saturday (if not, more throughout the week). It was so fun to be at our favorite place with each other. We usually walked on to every ride, whether we used a Fast Pass or did Single Rider. Josh was lucky enough to go to Club 33. I have been wanting to go forever, and he just waltzes in Orange County and is given a free ticket. What the heck? The real reason he got to go? Josh got an offer to work full-time out of the KPMG office!!! Woohoo!!!! I am so proud of him. He has until the beginning of September to accept. Thank you Josh, for working really hard this summer. He would not start until August or October of 2012. The later date would allow more time for the CPA exam.

One last thing I got to do in California before leaving, was have lunch with Josh's cousin, Amy, who is serving a mission. She is actually in Mission Viejo! That was fun reminiscing on my mission days, giving what little advice I have, and encouraging her and her companion that a mission is the best thing I have ever done (besides marry my best friend).


We were also fortunate enough to spend a week with Josh's family at the Lake Canandaigua lake house. It was so fun to have the whole family together. We were out on the boat everyday and me and Meg would try to lay out before the daily rain storms. We were also able to visit the church sites. Josh has seen them all a million times, but was a trooper when I wanted to go see them. We went to Palmyra, saw the temple, where they printed the Book of Mormon, Hill Cumorah, the Smith Family farm, and the Sacred Grove (which was my favorite).

(Not the most flattering picture of me, but you get the point)

Later on in the week, we went and saw the Whitmer (not Whitmore) farm in Fayette. We took the little tour and then walked through the farm house.

(The lady had her finger covering a majority of the lens, hence the cropped farm house picture.)

It was so neat to be able to actually visualize where the beginning of the church happened. I have read about it and taught it numerous times, but there is a wonderful spirit at each of these sites. One night while we were there, Josh's grandma and some other relatives-who live in the area-were able to come over and spend some time with us. I enjoyed getting to know everyone and seeing everyone again. The last time I saw any of them was at our wedding and you know how much time you get to sit and socialize at your own wedding!! I was able to talk to Yvonne (Grandma Whitmore) for some time. She was very pleasant to talk too and get to know better. And we found out that she is taking everyone on an Alaskan cruise next summer. Which puts our cruising at two for 2012! Thank you Yvonne! We can't wait. We also were able to play with our nephews and look forward to our first niece in December! We went on a treasure hunt on Squaw Island and celebrated both their birthdays! They were so fun!


Overall it has been a great summer and we are looking forward to our LAST school year!!! Seven more classes and I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. I returned to work yesterday and Josh is still figuring out his job situation. We have been very blessed and none of it goes unnoticed. I am going to make a special effort to stay on top of my blogging now that I am back in my normal routine and have a lot of time :)