in which i play catch-up

I added this picture because there needed to be some color up in here.

Ugh there are so many things that have happened and deserve to acknowledged. I was always really bad at writing in my journal. Every few months....or years..... I would get back to it and try to play catch up. And I would write pages and pages about what I'd been up to and the important milestones that had passed and hadn't yet been recorded. This would leave me totally burnt out and I wouldn't touch my journal for several more months. Or years. I eventually started just picking up where I left off instead of trying to cover everything that happened. It worked well, but I clearly haven't learned a thing because I'm going all the way back to April for this one. Although I will be using pictures and I'm typing instead of writing so my hand won't cramp up. Let's go. 

QUESTIVAL. Sometime in April we went on this big outdoor scavenger hunt called questival. The task list was pretty much everything cool to do in northern Utah. It was loads of fun. However, were we to do it again I think I could contribute more as a team manager instead of a member. Because let's be honest, I was all about the color coding and navigating, and place-finding, and picture-posting, but I wasn't the one trail running and climbing mountains and snowboarding. Though I did write our llama limerick, so...... there's that. We also signed up last minute, so we didn't have the time to gather equipment and map everything out the way we should have. If we'd had things like a paddle board or an extra mattress we could have gotten way more points. PLUS I told someone I'd cover their shift so I had to ditch out early which was AWFUL. Basically, we would have won if we'd had more time and money. Maybe. But anyway, Lindsay, Caleb, and Eythan are champs and it was worth it because it was superawesome hanging out with them. Especially the part where Lindsay and I found the rope swing in the dark, braced ourselves, hopped on, and it just spun in a lame circle. ALSO when the Peruvian restaurant just gave us cut-up hotdogs and french fries. haha. 

Then for my birthday my mom and dad took me and Eythan to see Les Mis at the Hale Center Theater, and it was fabulous. Like, so good. And the songs were stuck in E's head for SO LONG, it was hilarious. We took a picture with one of the actors who we had taken a picture with a few years before when he played Joseph (of the amazing technicolor dreamcoat variety - which E still has not seen, which is a crime.)

AND THEN on the morning of my actual birthday, this girl from work calls and asks me to come in, and I said no. And then I told E and he still had to set some stuff up, so we figured I might as well, and then I got to Victoria's Secret and my FRIENDS were there, and I was like *what a happy coincidence! good to see you!* And the scariest of all the managers said it was all a joke and I didn't have to work and my friends game me an envelope from E with cash and card because he knows I love shopping and my friends so he sent my shopping with my friends and bought us all cafe rio. My only regret is that I had worn my ugliest work clothes, so I just bought something else to wear. WHAT A CATCH. <3 <3 <3

Then we went to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and I wore my new nail polish, but I think those pictures on on E's phone. And we stayed at the Little America and played Jenga and it was very fancy.

We ate pizza on the floor, reminiscent of our early days at Wymount when we had no furniture. 

And once we drove out the lake and watched a movie on our laptop because we don't own a TV anyway and the lake was a better backdrop than our cinder block walls.

THE BEST was when we went to Disneyland again, with my family. E almost bought that stylish visor, but didn't want anyone mistaking him for an early bro from the 90s.
The first day in Disney we were Buzz and Woody.(Eythan even had a red handkerchief around his neck for a while.)

 
 (I am not very good at this game, but I beat him at Midway Mania every time, which seems a little backwards considering  I was  supposed to be Buzz.)

And the GREATEST THING EVER was finding out that Ashten was there on the same day! But we met up right when our Tower of Terror fastpasses were expiring so we only saw her for like two seconds, and that is the pits.

Doesn't this look like it should be called "photography" instead of just a picture. Disneyland, if you want to use this for a brochure, that's fine with me.

Space mountain family selfies.

Rachel went on Indiana Jones for the first time since she is finally tall enough, and she also went on Tower of Terror, despite mom's protestations. She loves Tower of Terror. And even mom went on it and said it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be. (And she bought the bathrobe in the gift shop, so clearly she secretly loved it.)

We got a gumbo bread bowl for dinner - we share a lot of things because we are broke.

I used to exclusively ride a carousel horse named Feather, but she disappeared after the renovations. :( So this time I rode Dasha, who is magnificent, and  chose his horse, whose name is Reginald.

And one day we dressed up as John Smith and Pocahontas. (notice the blue necklace -- it's all in the details.)

 

We went to the Animation Studio six times probably- these are pictures from when we were waiting for it to start and experimenting with taking "lens blur" photos - which didn't REALLY work out. Later, we had some of our drawings rolled up and we went on the tower of terror--and to me it looked like Eythan tossed them up a little bit to see if they would float, but he claims they just flew up on their own--either way they went right out the front of the elevator and were lost in the twilight zone. And when we went to look at our picture, we saw that  vvvvvv which made us crack up, but I was also very sad. (though I have since gotten over it.)

E tried his first dole whip!!!!!! Which he found "refreshing" and "delicious" and we were just in a great mood after that.

'

There's this thing they do at California Adventure called the Mad T Party, and there's a white rabbit DJ and once we saw a band with an undead or possibly just steampunk  Alice and Mad Hatter and this time we saw both Tweedles Dee and Dum as bouncers, which turned out to be a necessary precaution as some kids got busted for underage drinking right next to us.

 

We played with the kiddos in nursery a lot. And we LOVE THEM.

I finally hiked the Y after living in Utah County my entire life. And it was  pretty cool, I guess.

 E is still teaching old people at the senior MTC with his buddies. AND we just bought him some new dress pants because he has to wear them everyday and we're pretty excited about that.

 

We had shawarma with the Eckersleys, which is big in Romania and is in that credits scene on the Avengers. We shared, again, because we're broke.



  I refinished some furniture and maybe ruined the concrete on our balcony and spent a lot on spray paint.



 Plus we got invited to Rachel's Fairy Princess party and my mom is a master decorator/crafter/even planner. She handmade little fairy dolls and there were cupcakes and fruit and toadSTOOLS (toadstool stools if that was too quick for ya.) And I did fairy makeovers with shimmery eye shadow and bright pink lipstick (but I was only wearing neutral pink lipstick and didn't take any pictures of the kids.) Some of the seven year olds were pretty unpleasant and I didn't like them, but most of them were darling.


When were in Lehi one day, we went to the park where we first kissed/got engaged and climbed THE TREE, and there was a basket with sparkling cider and flowers and a necklace in the ring box and apparently it was the anniversary of our engagement and it was then that I learned that E is 1000x more romantic and thoughtful that I am.

 

Then Annemarie, Hannah, and I threw Aimee's bachelorette party. We don't ever remember to take pictures because this is the only one that I have! We had lunch at Zupas and then played games including Jaxson Jeopardy and had mocktails. *clink* Lovely.

Made dinner on a fancy stay-at-home date.

I am getting so bored of writing this. I am a terrible blogger. This is a neat picture from the orem summerfest. #nofilter. #fromthetopoftheferriswheel.

 Also from the top of the ferris wheel. yeehaw

The Stallings family had a reunion for my grandparents' 50th anniversary and I was really excited to take Eythan! We "got wood" from the wood pile, played some games, did some fireworks, and maybe did some things that the younger cousins weren't allowed to witness that led to even better fireworks.....

Eythan seemed to hit it off with the boy cousins (+Mynnette), and they lit off firecrackers in water bottles and stuff like that, and we played Betrayal at House on the Hill, which was a very elaborate, pretty creepy game.

We visited the Great Northern Carousel which is also an ice cream shop, as per tradition. There was also this place called the Staggering (pronounced stay-gering) Ox where they made sandwiches in tin cans and had a lot of hippie art everywhere.

This little girl was riding the carousel too and decided we were bestfriends for ten minutes. It was a little weird, but I liked her.

Then there was the party, and Heather suggested that we decorate the grandparents' car. So we ran (kind of literally) to the dollar store with Mynette, Hyrum and Andrew and managed to put streamers on a wet car and make it look pretty good. Grandma loved it, but Grandpa was not pleased.

So cute. But Grandpa had it washed and cleaned by like 9 AM the next morning.

(Grandma as they were being sent off: "Oh, did you get us a hotel too?") hahahaha

We bought cheap, neat fireworks to bring home to Utah. (legal here, just not available.)

Eythan climbed too high in some trees. I believe he fell out of one as well.

We sort of hiked Mt. Helena.













And got pasties! I believe they're a traditional English food that the miners would pack for lunch, and they're filled with meat and potatoes. Our family always makes them but it was fun to get them from the pasty truck. They tasted pretty much the same and were delicious. (Unfortunately they were out of huckleberry cream dessert ones, so maybe we should try making those.)

E thought it was so funny to take gross pictures of me because I sleep in the car for most of every road trip.

I'm not too vain to put these out there.











Eythan had his first bubble tea and we had some pretty gross Chinese food with the Eckersleys.

And this happened actually before Montana, but it is a freaking pain to move the pictures. We went to Idaho to see E's family and went to Yellowstone. On the way we were delayed by a GIANT HERD OF SHEEP. It was hilarious and it seriously sounded like people were making sheep noises which was super freaky. That was maybe the highlight of the trip, but we also went to the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone,

Dragon Hot Springs (I think? Maybe Dragon's Mouth Cave or something),

And took a picture by this sign because we were going to Montana like 3 days later.

We did Fourth of July stuff with E's family and someone graffiti-ed with a smoke

ball.

Once we went to a wedding at a legit Provo mansion, that had an entire play village in the backyard.

Aimee and Jaxson finally got married!!

 And the bridesmaids got beautiful corsages. (I was a bridesmaid. FINALLY. Lifelong dream fulfilled. And I will not be told that I was a bridesmatron, ANNEMARIE.)

 Also, my bestfriend came home from her mission!!!!!!! And has moved to Provo, so hopefully we will be seeing plenty of each other once we get into this year's groove.

 We also found some tickets and went to Ancestry.com's company party at Seven Peaks, which is really the only way to go because there's free food and free tubes.

 The boomerang was a terrifying as ever.

 I wish I wasn't so burned out from typing all this so that I could do justice to the Murder Mystery Party we went to. It was fabulous. The Eckersleys invited us because they are our couple friends, and we didn't know anyone else there, so I was kind of nervous. We got these character packets a couple of weeks beforehand so we could learn our roles. I was Vicky Damiano, who was the ex-wife of the guy who got murdered. Eythan was Stefano Hervey, the Italian mob boss from New York. The hosts did a spectacular job with the decorating. There were feather centerpieces, a chalkboard drink menu, legitimate poker table, etc. etc. They had candy cigarettes and very authentic mocktails. (read: they were sometimes pretty gross but tasted like the real thing which made it more exciting). I won't get into the story and whodunnit and all, but I will have you know that Inspector Garland is a no good two-timer, and that my Rebecca did what she had to do. SPECTACULAR. And now I want to host my own murder mystery, so if you're interested......

 Went to the zoo.
Saw the bird show.

And the pachyderm show. (Eythan loves elephants!)

 

They do tricks!
















 Tigers are my favorite animal, obviously. 

 We were only supposed to babysit two, but the whole gang came along and that was fine with us! Good thing we had popsicles, popcorn and teddy grahams on hand.

 We went camping with my fam, and Eythan built  discovered this fairy cottage.

And he picked me some flowers.

Ok now I'm all caught except we also just started school but forgot to take first day pictures :( So bye!

so, uh, you wanna come over sometime and hang out?

I thought I had work at 9 AM so I went there and everything and I actually don't work until four. Great.

Did you know that it's way harder to make friends after you're married? First of all, there is way less to relate to single people about nowadays, and if you want couple friends you both have to like both of them and have the time and money and compatible interests, schedules, and budgets (or lack thereof) to build something, and what am I supposed to do, just invite one of the ladies from my ward over to hang out? One on one? yikes.

It was nice when I lived in an apartment with five other girls, and lots of other girls and boys would come over on Sundays and we'd all eat cake. When Lizzie started hanging out with us, she started hanging out with US. We all talked and joked around and bonded. It was easy. Not so intense as like me inviting her over and us sitting on opposite couches and trying to get to the point.

BUT I lived at the Riv for a long time before I found all my people. I lived with cool girls who taught me a lot about being a girl but ended up liking my dumb ex-boyfriend probably a lot more than me, and then some friend-acquaintances for a while before hitting the jackpot. I always knew everyone because my calling forced me to be involved, but it took me a long time to stumble into those eternal friendships. Even in high school, our core group wasn't solidly formed until just before senior year.

Maybe I'll just have a lot of "me parties" (copyright jaime christensen) and watch a lot of one tree hill while the friendship bricks are slowly laid. This is pretty creepy but I've totally already picked out a few people that are awesome and that I would totally hang out with if that was a thing that happened. Is it? I don't know.  

on dropping out of college (sort of)

So British netflix is probably one of the greatest things happening for me right now.

And I clearly lost interest in this thing for a while, but it's fun, so I'm back!

Obviously, I was being very dramatic with the title. I didn't actually drop out of college. I didn't even really take a semester off. I'm in one class that I didn't get to take last semester because I was planning my wedding and getting married. In addition to all of that chaos, last semester was my first practicum and I didn't even get to take the spring or summer off. I was understandably very burned (burnt?) out, and I did not want to face another heavy semester. I probably could have survived, just didn't want to.

So, I didn't. I'm just in the one class.

I started looking for a job, and had one blissful, empty month where I did nothing. And then I landed a gig at what my mom told my little sisters is the "underwear store." (And they are not allowed to visit me there.)

Look, it's me at work! (in the back, though, so it's not very exciting.)

All black, tool belt, pink measuring tape, secret agent ear radio.

So my job is fun, and sometimes I run into people I know, which is only sometimes as weird as you would think it would be.

THE BEST PART, though?
 This.

We launched a new fragrance that goes for fifty-two dollars for the small box, and I got it for fifteen. Plus the tumbler and glasses were free with some underwear, AND I got a free T-Shirt Bra, which we are launching TOMORROW, so that's fun. (And I thought it best not to put pictures of my under-things on the internet, but they're great.) All in all, very cool. Free things are cool. Beautiful free things that I love are extra cool.

Basically,

Sometimes you just don't want to go to school, so you sell lingerie instead. I'm not the "full steam ahead" type. More the "stop and smell the perfume tester" type, so I'm very happy. And if you let me get up close and personal with my pink tape measure, I can make you really happy, too. (But it might make your wallet sad, cause yeesh. You get what you pay for, I suppose. Except in my case when it's sometimes free mwahaha.)

The point is. I'm loving having a job and contributing to society, and I smell great every time I come home from work and I know that if you're in a 34D and the band is too tight, you need to try a 36C.

This was not very eloquent, but I keep seeing people I know and I thought it would be nice if I warned everyone so they could mentally prepare for seeing someone they know while buying underwear, which can be really embarrassing if you're caught off guard. (I casually hid behind a large display when I saw a couple from my ward come in, because I was just not ready to be a part of that aspect of their lives, however professionally.

Ok that's all. I hope to see your pretty faces--and other body parts (tehe)-- soon.
Well that last part only applies to the girls, but you already knew that.

Till next time, folks.

people do crazy things... when they're in love

Today wasn't that bad of a day. It was long, but I had a couple of job interviews, went grocery shopping, and came home to cook a frozen pizza for dinner (and yes it was delicious). Eythan's in Idaho getting more surgery. So I watched Bones and contemplated cleaning the kitchen before he gets home tomorrow. But then everything was derailed because the bathroom flooded. That would happen when the man of the house is out of town, wouldn't it? 

It was probably the worst part of my whole life. Fine, it wasn't that bad, but that bathroom stole some awful hours that I will never get back. I seriously hope I killed all the germs, because it still freaks me out to step on the floor in there.

Now I'm watching Bones again, and eating apple slices and peanut butter, because now I am TOO TIRED to clean the kitchen. And I think it's really romantic that I cleaned that dang bathroom, because what I would really have liked to do is just move. 

-(I was identifying really hard tonight with Tom from Parks and Rec: 

"One time my refrigerator stopped working and I had no idea what to do. I just moved!")-

I feel that.

But here I am, because apparently I'm committed enough to spend my friday night disinfecting a bacteria-infested bathroom instead of hitting up the mall and burning this apartment complex to the ground so I could pretend this never happened. 

Ah, love. <3 

the famous photo wall

Well. Maybe one day it'll be famous. The point is I finally figured out what to do with that blank cinder block wall in the living room. We (read: I) stuck up a bunch of photographs of all the good times. MOST everyone I love made it onto the wall, along with a couple of people I don't really like, some old friends and acquaintances, and several complete strangers. (And I'm only counting the pictures that came from my life, not Eythan's.)

Since you can't examine the wall yourself and see how many photos you're in, (unless you come over, ) here's a list of (mostly) everyone who's in one or more of my contributions to the wall. (some are from places like other people's weddings, and there are people I've never seen before or since, so they don't count, ok?) :

I'll even put it in alphabetical order (by first name) so you can see if you made it,
(and there are some people who really should have, but I didn't have hard copies of any photos, so I'm sorry.)

Abby Millard
Abby Grout
Adam Lang
Aimee Wright
Amanda Farris
Angelina Dew
Annie Horne
Alex (soon-to-be) Lamoreaux (Richardson)
Alex Worthen
Alexis Danielson (Bradshaw)
Amanda Peterson (Riggs)
Amber Jones (McKenzie)
Andrew Eaton
Annemarie Pugmire
Ashley Anderson
Ashten Burt
Aspen Yocom
Austin Peterson
Bailey Wagstaff
Becca Cho
Belle
Blair Belone
Braden Packard
Brandon Jolley
Brenden Harris
Brianne Kirby
Brittin Squires
Cameron Comer
Cassie Rasmussen
Chase Lindsey
Chris Hoffman
Chris Stallings
Christine Buehler
Coach Clark
Courtney Chapman (Petersen)
Dan from Imagine Dragons (just sayin)
Darin Stallings
Derek Rees
Devon McCaffree
Dezrea Gertsch (Kelley/Spencer)
Eloria Weekes (Brown)
Emily Rogers
Erik Christensen
Erin Christensen
Erin Cowley
Essen Skabelund
Esther Raty
Eythan Barney
Gabrielle Ames
Haley (soon-to-be) Shumway (Hunt)
Hanicka Harmon
Heather Glathar
Heather Granata
Isabelle Griswold (Aguilar)
Jaime Christensen
Jared Arnell
Jazzi Hill
Jeff Elison
Jenna Hoffman
Jenna Watson (Marsden)
Jesse Brenner
Jessi McKenzie
Jessica Jensen
Jessie Meyer (Carillo)
Jordan Bumgardner
Josh Sellers
Josh Watson
Julianne Fairbanks
Kanecia Gordon
Katelyn Lindstrom
Katie Webber
Kaylie Rush
Kim Bennett
Kira Day
Kirsten (soon-to-be) Morgan (Christensen)
Krystal Stevens
Kyle Baugh
Laken Jacobs (Lott)
Laura Jones (Potts)
Lauren Granata
Lauren Schow (Patterson)
Lexi Patterson
Lillie Hammock
Liz Poulsen
Lizzie Hegstrom
London Granata
Lyndsie Broadhead (Hansmann)
Madi Webber
Makayla Johnson
Mallory Romine
Mark Lierman
Mary Wilson
Megan Anderson (Farra)
Megan Livingston
Megan Ross
MerylAnne Dexter
Michelle Stallings
Mikaela Hamilton (Kauffman)
Mr. Andersen
Myka Watson
Mynette Stallings
Natalie Stallings
Nate Stebbing
Nate Morris
Nathan Egan
Nichole Berry
Parker Shumway
Rachel Stallings
Raphael Barney
Samantha Garza
Sami Romine
Sandra Shurtleff
Santa
Sara Corbett (Richardson)
Sarah Crandall
Sarah Hanson
Seulbee Lee
Sierra Klein (Wagstaff)
Shanna Becker
Skyler Colledge
Sophia Pugmire
Stacie Faulk
Stallings Family (all the aunts, uncles, cousins, g-parents)
Tanner Remsburg
Tara Facer
Taylor Savio
Todd Stallings
Travis Berry
Tyson Meyer
Whitley Glad (Gordon)
Will Corry
Vikki Downs
Virgithmar Molina
Zane Smith

Way random list, right? Some of those are my best friends, some I barely know. Obviously not nearly everyone on the list is going to see this, but it would be kind of cool if they found out their picture was on my wall. It's a little weird to think you could go to Girls' Camp with someone, or be on the same debate team, and five years later, your picture is up in their house.

I dunno. Just sometimes I sit on my couch and get distracted by the photo wall and I could just look at it forever.

And while I'm looking at those pictures that represent truly meaningful people and times from my life, I reflect on just how much sticky tack it took to make those dumb pictures stick to the wall.

resolved, 2014

I'm not going to be conscious of these things during the year, really. But hopefully I was going to do all of them anyway.

1. Go to Disneyland.
2. Get more money.
3. Therefore, get a job.
4. Buy more lipstick. (with that money from that job)
5. Rock that lipstick.
6. Temple, monthly.
7. Read that BOM.
8. See my friends regularly.
9. Go on lots of dates.
10. Ask more people to take pictures of me and Eythan, rather than attempt the awkward two-person-selfies or the separate pictures of us doing the same thing. (but don't eliminate those entirely, because they can be pretty cute.)

Both have their place, right?