Oh...all his dreams came true!

Warning: The following content contains all kinds of sappy love stuff!

Joey and I are so lucky that we meet each other at such a young age. Not everyone finds their spouse when they are only thirteen years old. We started off as friends and look at us now, living happily ever after!

A lot happens in the short years that we are teenagers and I love that Joey and I experienced much of that time together. One of my favorite things is going back and reminiscing about our youth. Every once in awhile I come across something that takes me back, it can be a picture from a High School dance, a gift that he gave me, even something as simple as a song can trigger all kinds of fun memories of us at a younger age. While visiting my Grandma Julie this past weekend she informed me that she had come a crossed a letter that Joey wrote me, looking over it I realized that it was from back when I was about fifteen years old, making Joey only sixteen or so. This letter made me remember a much younger Joey and it defiantly reminded me of why I fell in love with him.

I thought that I would share the letter he wrote me (Joey don’t kill me).

click on the image to enlarge it....






It looks to me as if his dreams are all coming true!

Holiday Traditions

As much as I hate to see the warm summer nights fade I can’t help but get excited for the coming cold weather that will bring us the Holiday Season. Amazing enough but I have some of the warmest memories from some of the coldest months of the year. Utah’s winter months can be brutal but they also warm my heart with thoughts of family and good holiday memories. Times like these remind me of how lucky I am to have such wonderful holidays and great family to share it with.

Joey and I have been together for 8 years now and we have spent some very memorable holidays with both of our families. The thing that I have loved most is seeing how different holidays are spent between our two families. I have come to find that not everyone’s holidays are alike, that everyone has their own touch on what holidays should be. When you think of holiday traditions you instantly think of carving pumpkins for Halloween, eating a big turkey dinner with family on Thanksgiving, maybe you put cookies out for Santa on Christmas Eve, these are all holiday traditions that most of us can share. I started thinking about what sets my family apart and makes it special to us and it brought me great memories of coming in from trick-or-treating, frozen from head to toe and my mom handing me a great big bread bowl full of hot chili to warm me up. After dinner we would lay out all our candy on the floor and start the bidding, trading Snickers for Skittles, Butterfingers for Pez, always thinking that we had hit the jack pot and that our stash was better than the next.

Just when I thought that no one’s holidays could compare to my own I went and spent a Thanksgiving with Joey’s family and saw that while their traditions are very different from those of my family, they are every bit as meaningful. One tradition that has gotten me every Thanksgiving since is everyone standing to say what they are thankful for. The first time this ides was introduced to me I thought it was going to be hard and a little silly (nothing like putting you on the spot) however, it didn’t take long before I had tears streaming down my face. Everyone was so open with how they felt, honesty like that isn’t something that you experience very often; it’s defiantly a tradition that will pass down to our family.






As we get older I have noticed that traditions are changing and growing with our age. I won't always get to bunk up with my little brothers and read them stories on Christmas Eve. As we grow we will need to add new traditions to our lives. Joey and I are so excited about our first holiday season as our own little family, this will be the first of many to come and I hope that as our family grows so will our holiday traditions.

I would love to hear some other traditions that other people have, maybe something that you think is really special to your family.


We may have been pushing it this year....I just can't let go of a good thing:-)

Dinner Night

Every Thursday night we get together with some of our friends for a dinner night. It's really gives us a chance to hang out with good friends and show of our specialty dishes. Joey and I hosted at our house last week and I made an Italian dinner that consisted with hot spinach and artichoke dip, homemade lasagna, green salad and garlic bread. After dinner we usually play video games, cards or just hangout and chat. This particular night we decided to help our friend Cassie get ready for her open house party she was going to have the following weekend, what better way to help than making Jell-O-shots?!? We started off thinking that we would make a couple batches........250 Jell-O-shots latter we called it good;-) We put the shots in a witch’s caldron for the party and it was a hit!


Yesterday we went to Eckman home and enjoyed good company along with a great dinner made mostly of fresh produce from the garden. Cassie made us fresh salsa and stuffed bell peppers...yummy! We are so lucky to have such wonderful friends!

Thanks again Cassie, dinner was awesome!

They say things change once you get married....

Everyone told me that things would change once Joey and I got married, the fact that we have been together so long made me doubt that this would be true in our case. Now that we are married looking back at the question I think that I have changed my mind, I agree that things have changed. Joey and I grow closer with every experience we have together and getting married is definitely one of those life experiences that can impact you greatly.

I was thinking of examples of things that have changed now that Joey and I are married and little things came to mind, for example I had made a small comment to Joey last week about how I could only remember one time in eight years that he had cooked me breakfast. Knowing that Joey doesn't do much in the kitchen I thought nothing else of it, until I woke up on Sunday morning to the smell of bacon. Not only did I appreciate the fact that I didn't have to fix us breakfast that morning but I really appreciated the deeper meaning behind his gesture. It’s the little experiences like this one that show me that with small amounts of communication and a little effort our relationship will continue to grow as will our love for each other. I will happely except change. It was a great morning!

Please note that it's on a paper plate.....washing dishes would be out of the question;-)

At home grooming;-0

We love our dogs so much but at times they can be really high maintenance. Due to Pucks recreant spine injury I have been really leery of taking her to be groomed. With all the progress she had been making I was very fearful that they would reinjure her in some way. After months of making excuses and putting it off she started resembling a Rastafarian, dreads and all. Joey finally came up with the solution of doing it ourselves; leery at first I agreed to let him give it a try. Nervous and excited to see how he did I rushed home from work and what I found was a half shaven terrified little dog. He was able to shave her body, one leg and half her face before he gave up. After I was done laughing I realized that we had to finish her because we couldn't take her to the groomer's looking that crazy. This was not a good look for her! It took both Joey and I all night to finish the job. I have a new respect for all groomers out there and it is definitely worth the $80 bucks to take them in. Seeing that we both had never attempted anything like this before, I was impressed with the final results, so impressed that we latter did Chevy who wasn't much easier. As good as we did I don't think that we will go into the grooming business anytime soon.
BEFORE
AFTER

Wait! I thought I was your dear....oh that deer ;-)

Other than hockey Joey's other love would be hunting in Manti with his brother-in-law. In my opinion I just think that he just likes going up the mountian and drinking with the boys, never the less I'm proud to report that he was able to "put food on the table" as he would say. He always has to defend himself being the city boy and all. Last year his deer was really a freak deer only having horns on one side and it took four shots (all hits) to put it down. I believe he was getting frusterated because he held the scope close his face and the recoil sent the scope into his eye causing it to bleed a bit. Joey is now known around Manti as Scope Eye, it's awesome!

Good Job on this year's deer...he has a full rack and everything!

I Love the Zoo!!

All us Modern Display gals try to get together at least once a month for a little outing. This month we decided that we wanted to do something outdoors well knowing that the nice weather is fading fast and it will soon be Winter. After many ideas we decided on going to the Zoo! One gal form work (Allyson) was so excited because she had never been to our Zoo and this was going to be a real treat compared to the Idaho Zoo she was use too. We had a blast! For those of you who are like me and only visit the Zoo every five years or so, they have really given that place a face lift and added so many new exhibits.