October

Two words: Fall Break. It's the best thing ever and I wish BYU jumped on that bandwagon. UVU had their fall break last week and it came at the best time. Garrick is taking his heaviest load yet this semester so that next semester will be easy since baby will be here. He has been so overwhelmed with his coursework (even though I keep reminding him that grades don't matter at this point). So fall break was the perfect time for him to be completely lazy and carefree for a couple days. He came home on Wednesday night after taking a test with ice cream and hot wings in hand as he declared "It's fall break!" He then proceeded to move our mattress into the living room, turned on netflix with his wings and ice cream by his side. It remained in our living room until Sunday night, it was so fun. 

While I had carefree Garrick, I told him I really wanted to do a session in the SLC temple so we went up on saturday during fall break and enjoyed the afternoon in Salt Lake with Dallas and Lauren. 

Every time I go, I'm completely mesmerized of the beauty in this temple. I'm so glad that we live close to visit. 

Right after we got home from Salt Lake we went to a corn maze with some friends in the ward. We successfully navigated our way through the maze and came out with free pumpkins and coupons to restaurants. With our coupons we went to Sub Zero to get free ice cream and then went home to watch a scary movie. 

Like I said, fall break is the best. It was the perfect weekend. And now Garrick is living at school again studying and taking midterms while I'm counting down the days until Thanksgiving break!

Family of Two

I love getting pictures taken of Garrick and I, it's part of the vainness of my generation, I'm sure. But I love how pictures can capture personalities and time periods. Our newly-wed time period is coming to a close with baby gaffney coming in January, and I wanted to document the last few months of being a family of two. So I made my sis, Kayla take pictures for us while we were at the Mapleton house. We wanted it to be a pretty quick and painless so it literally only took 10 minutes but Kayla was able to capture so many pictures that I love! 

Here's to 12 more weeks of just us.

September Highlights

I was pretty bummed to see Garrick start school but I was pretty thrilled that I didn't have to. But he started the year with a bang, hearing back from 5 medical schools we were pumped preparing for his interviews.

I had a pretty fun time dressing Garrick up for his interviews. We saved up so we could buy him a snazy new suit, with all the accessories! I think he looks pretty dang hot! He flew to my home in Iowa for his first interview, the school was in Kansas City which is only 2 hours from my house so it worked out great. Kansas City was tied for his first choice, so he was super anxious to go and to learn more about the school. I was attached to my phone the entire day wanting pictures and updates of everything he was doing and seeing. 

He finally called me at the end of the day while he drove home describing everything. He had fallen in love with the school! He couldn't stop talking about how incredible the program was, how it had everything he wanted and how it fit perfectly with his learning style. There wasn't a single thing he could find that he didn't like about the school.  He was happy with his interview and so impressed with everything about the school, so much so that he cancelled the interview he had at Arizona later that week. I was pretty worried after hearing him decide that he wanted to cancel an interview since it took away another option but Garrick was confident that Arizona wasn't a school he was interested in. 

For the rest of the month, Garrick extensively researched the other schools he was going to be interviewing at and he just couldn't get excited. KC was the school he wanted. With each passing week he got more and more depressed. He was part of the second week of interviewees at KC which meant he wouldn't be hearing anything until the students before him had heard. Finally at the end of the month we were at the mall getting my phone fixed when he saw that a student had written on their student networking site that he had been accepted to Kansas City-finally the school was starting to accept students! But hearing this news and not receiving an email from them only made Garrick more sad! He was driving me crazy at this point. But sure enough the very next day Garrick received the glorious email congratulating him on his ACCEPTANCE! It was amazing! Garrick was part of the very first wave of students to be interviewed and accepted into his dream school. We couldn't be more excited or feel more blessed. I am so incredibly proud of Garrick, he has dedicated his life these past 3 years for this point, I can't think of anyone who deserves it more. So he accepted, obviously, and once we paid the deposit he cancelled the rest of his interviews. We are going to be living in Kansas City for the next 3 years! 

We introduced our "little brother" Tommas to the world of football. He handled the 4 hour game as expected, and ended up crashing as soon as we got to the car to take him home. But it was a good game so it was a fun one to take him to. 

This is to document that I have a growing baby inside of me, it's still so weird! 

We went on a last minute camping trip with the Beck's and Hancock's. It was fun being outside and admiring the gorgeous fall trees! I also want to note that this is the first camping trip I've been on since pregnant where I actually slept! Our tent was on an hill and somehow it made Garrick and I sleep like babies!

I've been hating our nightstands ever since we moved apartments. The white worked perfectly with our bedroom in our old apartment but when we moved it looked gross. So I enlisted the help of our good friend Jesse to transform these bad boys. I decided that I wanted to make it a more classic piece, white is trendy right now and I'm already over it! So we striped the paint and stained the wood to make this awesome nightstand you see! Jesse also replaced the tops so it looked less like ikea. I'm in love with how they turned out. And I loved the experience, I already told Garrick that I need an electric sander, heat gun, and a work table for future projects...

And that sums up our September. I'm so glad fall is here!

The Post Grad Life

Since graduating from BYU in June, I have transitioned into the world of work. I work as an academic advisor for the School of Family Life. I sit down with students interested in family life, sociology, gerontology, and help them plan out their life during BYU and after. Somehow I'm qualified to do this job, even though I have no idea what I want to do with my life! But I have my own office, plants, lunch breaks, this is real adulthood! 

Living the job life, I have many hours after work just to myself. Garrick is a very dedicated student and doesn't come home until late each night. So I have been left to discover new ways to pass the time that doesn't involve mindless Netflix watching. Paint by numbers has become my solution, my best friend. I love to create but often don't have the energy or ability to paint or draw freestyle. Paint by numbers is my creative outlet, and it's so easy! You wouldn't be able to tell from my picture but I have poured hours into this painting and I'm so proud of how it's coming along. It's so fulfilling! I've also read 3 books since working and have a long list of sewing projects to tackle. I'm fulling embracing this post grad life!

Labor Day

This summer Garrick has been more adamant about getting outdoors. He has been wanting to get into backpacking for a while now but it just never happened. He finally got to go with the UVU outdoors club a couple weeks ago and he feel in love. Immediately after that hike he wanted us to be a backpacking family! I, on the other hand, was a huge supporter of camping but very scared of backpacking. The idea of carrying all of your gear for miles just sounded miserable! But somehow he convinced me go, 22 weeks pregnant mind you! 

We went to REI at least 3 times in the last 2 weeks, making sure we were getting the right gear. Garrick made sure that I had good gear to ensure a positive experience! 

It actually turned out to be such a fun trip! We hiked a little over 6 miles and saw 9 lakes! It was beautiful and peaceful. We were able to talk and laugh, listen to music and just enjoy the beautiful scenery. The trees were beginning to change colors which got me so excited for fall! Garrick was an angel the entire trip, he made sure we took lots of breaks and thought of everything to make the trip enjoyable. For example, the evening and morning were super cold but Garrick was prepared; he brought me lots of warm layers to wear and even packed hot chocolate! I was so impressed at how thoughtful he was throughout the entire trip. Aside from the sleepless night we had it was the perfect trip! We've done a couple of camping trips this summer but I love it when we go alone-just the two of us. We've decided it will be a permanent tradition!

I love that Garrick nudges me out of my comfort zone and pushes me to do hard things. It always results in something incredible! I guess we can be a backpacking family. 

Birthday Boy

Garrick did such a good job with my birthday, I really wanted to make his special. I had been thinking about his birthday gifts for months, positive that he had no idea what was coming but knowing that he'd love them! Slowly but surely Garrick guessed all of his gifts one by one, I'm such a terrible liar that there was no way to deceive him. I was pretty disappointed that knew most of his presents but it turned out okay because he loved them! We spent the Saturday before his birthday hiking, eating free birthday meals including his favorite Red Lobster and ended the night at the movie theater watching Mission Impossible. I had other plans but they fell through, Garrick was a good sport and made me feel better about the day. I'm realizing more and more I am not a good planner!

Huhot which resulted in a food coma.

Hiking in Provo Canyon with our brand new hiking boots!

The very handsome birthday boy lovin on his gifts. 

Since his actual birthday was on Sunday it was a little harder to make it special. But I made him breakfast in bed, as well as homemade cafe rio for dinner, and then enojyed the night eating cake and playing games with family. 

A week later Garrick got to cash in on one of his birthday gifts for a 60 minute horseback riding lesson! He has been talking about riding horses for months! So I happily found a groupon deal that would get him on a horse! He looked so cute riding, it's been years since he was on one and had never ridden one freely so it was pretty fun. But now he's convinced that we need to buy horses....I may have created a monster. 

The other day I was on the phone with my mom and she jokingly said that Garrick helped raise me. I couldn't agree more! Looking back, I was such a baby when we met! He truly has helped me grow to be the person I am today. He has taught me so much about hard work, patience, selflessness, determination and so much more. He is the most incredible person and I hope that I can be more like him. I'm so so so grateful for him and all that he does for our little family. I'm incredibly lucky to have found my prince charming so early on. Happy birthday honey!! 26 looks so good on you!