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2011-12-01T13:18:00.001-08:00

Well I wanted to get all of this written down before I forgot it all :) We have our first baby on the way! As of now I am 18 weeks and 3 days.... give or take 3 days haha!

So taking a picture of myself wasn't very easy! ( I really hate this picture of myself but I need it for posterity!) I wanted to get a picture at the earlier stages for comparison... oh well. At least I have this one now. So I have been feeling like I really show right now... after seeing the picture and hearing people over and over tell me im not showing.. I guess I'm STILL not showing hehe oh well. Guess I should be thankful for that!

Well I wanted to get down on words how things have been so far:

Well about 4 months ago I did start to feel different. Really the only two things that stuck out was feeling so overwhelming hungry and getting tired about mid-day. I had been putting off testing because I had been getting a lot of negative test previously. I was trying to forget about it, and it had worked.I did! So one day I just decided to test again. I put it off all morning, then finally in the middle of the day just decided to go for it. Got a positive result immediately! No need to wait the 1 min or 3 min, whatever it is. Just showed up right away! I really didn't believe it ( and still didn't for about 3 days after). I decided I need a digital test that actually said "pregnant". Brett wasn't going to be home for another hour so I ran to WalMart. I literally jumped out into the car and sped over! haha. I think I knew deep down in my head it was real, and I felt excited. But still!! Yes I felt dumb going in an only getting a pregnancy test... so I decided to buy some oranges. Because buying oranges would make it so less obvious! HAHA NOT! I'm sure the check out girl was laughing at me in her head :) So I got home, took the test and yep! Another quick positive! "pregnant!"

By now Brett was due to come home in 30 min. I texted him and told him "it would be great if you could be home right on time today". Haha! I think he was still 10 min late... geez Brett!!! Just kiddin....
So I think I cleaned everything a human possibly can in 30 min. Dishes, swept, tidy'ed up..... I kept going through my head all the fun ways people break the news to their husband. I couldnt think of anything! Plus we were heading to a friends barbecue in 30 minutes! So I just waited patiently for him to come home. I saw him pull up and just sat at the table waiting for him. He came in the door, shouted out his usual " Im Hooooome!" I lost my nerves and started getting teary eyed sitting at the kitchen table. He came over and asked whats wrong( looking back I should have said something mean like, our dog just died! He is always teasing me, I should have used this to get back at him!) So I just told him I needed him to come home right away. I pulled out the tests and showed him. I knew he wouldn't realize what the "double line" test was( perhaps that's also why I went and got a digital one) so I pulled out the other and showed and he just stared at them looked shocked, then smiled. Now I have to tell you, I have prepared Brett for this moment many times. Like I said, Brett is such a tease, so I told him he HAD to say something positive when this moment actually came. He looked up at me and said " That's so exciting!" I could tell by the way he said it really wanted to say OH CRAP! Haha. I started laughing and we both just laughed together. Well we had about 10 min to be at our friends barbecue, so we jumped in the car and left! haha!

It was kind of funny to show up there with this huge bombshell we just discovered. And to top it off, we had previously gotten a puppy.... 3 days earlier! So we got a brand new puppy... then got pregnant, hahah! It was a great memory, and we have had tons of fun with the excitement already. Even though we can find out the gender anytime, we have decided to keep it a surprise until Christmas Day. We will have our next ultrasound on Dec 9th ( thanks to Scott and Erica!) We will wrap up the "results" and TRY to keep it a secret until Christmas.

13 weeks :)

Our good friends Scott and Erica were nice enough to "hook us up" with an ultrasound. Brett was able to do it himself!

I'm thinking my next post will need to be the video of me breaking the news to my family.. oh it is so great! Stay tuned!

A New Found Hope

2011-02-11T10:37:00.000-08:00

I am going to try and use this blog more. We will see how that goes! I could spend forever trying to catch up thi sblog on everything we have done the past year. But I am going to start with today( maybe do a flashback another day )

I have always used thig blog to tell the good thing going on, tell about all the fun stuff, and maybe sometimes leave out the real things. Today I will be real.
I mostly feel inclined to write today so that I can record my own feelings. I know I can do that in a personal journal or something, but at the same time, the things I am feeling are things to be shared!

Lately I have struggled with normal human (girly emotional) struggles. :) Feelings of inadequecy, feelings of hopelessness. That I am just here to get through life. Feelings that I cant get through this on my own, so I guess its a lost cause. I should just give up and be happy with a mediocre life. Now I am not complaining of my life. I have a VERY blessed life right now. A great life, great husband, great family, a wonderful home, where I feel happy and safe. I am not lacking in much right now. But what I had realized I was lacking in was spiritual nourishment. Now I have never been one of those people that was super dedicated to scripture reading, studying, praying and all of that. But I guess recent questions and concerns have driven me to this, because I had no where else to go. I had exhausted all the other options. I didnt even think to turn to what I knew was the solution the whole time.

It has only taken me a few days of putting in an honest effort, to feel the difference! What was I thinking before?? Even as I am writing this, i am realizing things I hadnt realized I was feeling before. I have never really understood the scriptures. Never really could relate them to myself. I have had spiritual highs throughout my life. im not saying that I have never felt the spirit or had a trstimony of the scriptures. Life crazy and sometimes you just get off the bandwagon! And I was off!

This week I have put an honest effore into my scripture study and prayers. I dont want to stop now.
The first day I read in the sciptures how we should pray through the guidance of the Holy Ghost. I didnt understand how that was possible. ( Mostly because I hadnt tried in a long time). I prayed to know how to do this. The next time was so inspiring. I now pray through the guidance of the Holy Ghost. I can finally express in my prayes exactly what I am feeling. Which has always been hard for me for some reason. I know how I am feeling but how do I put it into words?? I actually had phrases and words put into my mind, the exact words I had been searching to express.
I have also learned the power of music. I always have some kind of music playing when I am home. Never bad music, just something to fill the silence. I have learned that listening to uplifting and soft, spiritual music ( not necessarily just hymns) is very inspirational. It instantly brings the spirit into my home, and helps make scripture study and prayer more meaningful. I dont know how ir works, it just does! It is almost instantaneous.
I have learned how important it is to have the companionship of the Holy Ghost. For me, the best way to do that right now is through music. It is also by praying through the Holy Ghost. And as a consequence, he is there. The Holy Ghost has the piwer to guide our every action. Not tell us what to do, but help us make better decisions.
I also, in only the last few days, I have felt an overwheming amount of hope. Just hope in being happy, and being loved. Finally having hope that I can have a real relationship with God again. I have a hope that iIcan overcome my small ( but seemingly huge to me) problems. I have hope that whatever comes, I really dont have to do it a lone. I now understand the concept of having "weak things be made stronger". While I havent been able to over come ALL of my weaknesses in a week, I can see it in the futures, and that is my hope. that I can see my goals in the future. If we pray for strength to overcome our small weaknesses ( truly and earnestly) we will get it!

Also, I dont feel that scripture study is a painful as it sounds haha. It is different for everyone. I tried going a long with a manual, and that didnt work for me. Sometimes I try to start from the beginning and go to the end. That doesnt always work for me either. I used to spend my mornings doing what I wanted. Checking emails, breakfast ( well I guess that ones OK) TV. I dont know, bascially just wasted away the morning. But I have found my days to be sooooo much better, more uplifted, just plain HAPPIER when I spend, even just 30 min to trying to feel the spirit. Today I just decided to read about hope. I found a scripture and just kept reading after it. I ended up reading the last two chapters of 2 Nephi. Some of the scriptures that stood out to me.
2 Nephi 31:20 " Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a prefect brightness of HOPE, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward feasting upon the word of Christ and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father, Ye shall have eternal life."

2 Nephi 32 : 8-9 ....... "But behold, I say unto you that ye must pray always, and not faint; that ye must not perform any thing unto the Lord save in the first place ye shall pray unto the Father in the name of Christ, that he will consecrate they performance unto thee, that thy performance may be to the welfare of thy soul."

Now I know this is a very different blog post than my others. And like I said, I could have written this all in a personal journal ( which I am no good at ) so bacially its easier for me to type it lol. Plus I feel that these are all good things to share!

Well thanks for sitting through that!

Giveaway!

2010-03-12T09:00:00.000-08:00

My photo techer from BATC is doing an awesome giveaway! Heres the link!

phototips.alexismiller.com

A little Bit of Home

2009-12-11T11:56:00.000-08:00

Heres just a little taste of my new hometown... Pretty huh?

Lifes a Little Crazy Right Now!

2009-09-23T11:12:00.000-07:00

Life is taking a big turn for us but we are very excited! This weekend we are moving to Ephraim. Brett is going to be taking over his dads CPA business in the future, so we are making the move down! We will be staying in a couples house who are on a mission, and we are very grateful and excited! So now we are just frantically packing up stuff, getting everything read. Oh and today I graduate from Bridgerland in Media Design Technology! Woo hoo! Ok, I gotta go pack!

Never Thought This Day Would Come

2009-08-19T13:17:00.000-07:00

Today is a day to be celebrated. I have completed a task that I never though possible. Through blood, sweat, and yes, tears I have finally completed my Computer Literacy class! I wanted to give you a little taste of what this class is like. First of all this is a class for learning all of the Microsoft Word programs. It truly has been a beneficial class for me, I cant deny that. But who knows when I will need to create a formula in Access with keyboard shortcuts to calculate the sum of the totals of cells G:2 through cells G:12 then import it into Excel to create a graph(perhaps a 3d Pie chart with default 2-d style) then go back to access and change my formulas then back to excel to update my links then import my pie chart into powerpoint and apply the bevel style, apply transitions and smart art graphics to my bullets then print everything as handouts with 6 per page in black and white. (Oh wait, I forgot to capitalize the "C" in charts, gotta start over.)So glad I am learning all of this to be a photographer.That could come in handy someday.

Let me break this down for you.

We start with one assignment. These assignments take no less than twenty minutes and can easily take up to an hour.

Each assignment is usually more than one page, this particular one is seven pages.

My lovely teacher required that assignements also be saved on the school computer drive so she can look at them "up close" so I had to write the file destination starting from 'My Computer' on every page( which you can see on the bottom of this paper)..... plus my name, my class, the unit, the exercise, and the exact bullet number on EACH page, so she doesnt get confused :) Now this class is done through the business department, where they are very particular about the work. It was not uncommon for me to have to "fix"my mistakes which were usually me mistyping a word, or putting an extra space between my numbers.

So now from here we go to units. There are five assigments per units.

There are 4 units per section, at five assignments per unit, equalling 20 assignments. Here is one unit worth of work.

So now we put it all together: one assignment-30 min 5 assignemnts per unit, four units per section. There are 12 sections.I will let you do the math on that one.....

* keep in mind, one assignment can be up to 7-10 pages...

But dont worry, it all condenses to one nice stack:

Well I came out of the class with an A-. Propably from all of the evil stares I gave her;)

Lake Powell

2009-07-21T11:27:00.001-07:00

I am pretty sure I married into the right family! I got to go on my first Lake Powell Family Reunion this year, and it was such a blast! I was so excited to go the whole year, and it finally came. The week was full of swimming, eating, laughing, sweating, boating and water weenies! We got to Ephraim the day before and went down to the High School to watch the fireworks there. It was so cool to watch them explode right over the top of the temple!

So the next day we all got up early and left for the lake! The first day we were having a hard time with the motors( along with the rest of the week) so it took us a while to get going to go out and find a spot. The lake was pretty full so we had to just setlle with a spot for the night. It actually turned out to be a nice spot but had zero shade so it was very hot and the sun came up at about 5 and didnt set until 10! This was our first place:

So the next day we went venturing out to find a new spot and we found a pretty great one. It was underneath a huge shelf so we had shade all day. It was like our own little private cove
I had such a great time with all of the little neices and nephews. It is fun to be called Aunt Stacy!
So this is the Infamous Water Weenie, or Water Shark, or Banana Boat. But by popular demand.."Water Weenie" You can fit six people on it and it is a blast, but it sure is rough!
.

One of my favorite things to do was to go on our own little personal jet Ski Runs ;) Which unfortunately led to some pretty horrifying dreams for Kristy....

So just ONE of the high lights of the week for me was catching the BIGGEST fish out of all the fishermen! I would of had one even bigger, they say by almost 6 inches but it got away right at the boat!

I had a good time fishing,even though the fish werent biting very much. The only was we could really catch something was to drive the boat around looking for "boils". This is when all of the Stripers gang up on the poor little innocent fishies, swarm around them pushing them to the top then attack! All you can see all of these huge stripers jumping in and out of the water, making the water look as if it were "boiling". It was so weird to watch, but cool.

We took a day trip and went down to a big arch, ate some lunch and swam, then went to hole in the rock. And of course, did some cliff jumping...Heres Brett jumping( I love Mary at the end hah)

And of course, there was Skiing

It was FANTASTIC week, cant wait for next year!

Awesome

2009-06-23T20:53:00.001-07:00

It worked! Well I know this is a little late but I had a great time a while back with my Mom coming up to visit and getting to see family. It was a tiring few weeks though, we had gone camping the weekend before we went to Escalante with some friends and we had a really good time. They had this cute little cart you could use to carry your things back and forth, I don't know how the pioneers did it! We could hardly do it over flat grass with just a few sleeping bags in it!
Alright, I didnt figure out how to post pictures through Word, so the problem has not been solved...

Just Testing

2009-06-23T20:43:00.001-07:00

I'm sure some of you agree, trying to post something with lots of pictures can be difficult. I am going to try it though Microsoft Word, so this is a test!

Way Overdue

2009-06-23T20:21:00.000-07:00

Alright, so "blogging" is not a skill of mine apparently. Of all the computer things I do, I just cant seem to keep up with this blog! Well I guess the last time this ws updated was when we started our garden( which by the way is doing great!, now that its stopped raining) So we have put a lot of work into this garden. We have tilled it twice and weeded twice to get ready for planting. So the day before we are going to plant we go out and find huge " Thing" in the middle of the plot, with four little plants in it,right smack in the middle! It was in the most inconveneint place, taking up a third of our plot. Lets just say Brett wasnt very happy......So we moved it.

Long story short, the guy that planted them was our neighbor who ends up working with Dallin at his new job. He bring it up at work that he had planted a garden and some people " just came and moved it" So Dallin made sure it was very clear to them that we had done all the work ;) All in all,. they were just fine with it.We are so lucky to have these beautiful flowers blooming all over our yard!

The Amazing Garden Tiller!

2009-04-27T13:46:00.001-07:00

We are getting ready to plant our garden, we are so excited! We are planting carrots, corn, tomatos, sweetpeas, squash, pumpkins, lots of stuff! So Brett just couldnt wait to get out there and use the new powertool we borrowed... Men..... gotta love em'

Hes got a long way to go... the other end is at the black arrow!

He did good, got the whole thing done, now we just need to wait for it to warm up a little!

You have got to be kidding me...

2009-04-16T11:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHPYPOo-oDQ&feature=PlayList&p=ABFC3B5641F6CE5B&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=38

So what happens when this thing falls out? " exscuse me.. my bumpit fell out"

Our Winter Storm

2009-03-09T17:43:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was such a nice day! Sun shining, nice and warm, almost all the snow melted! Well we woke up the next morning to this:

Guess we wont get ready for our garden quite yet :)

Just a little motivation....

2009-03-09T15:38:00.000-07:00

So I am finally fed up with telling Brett that "I need to lose weight" " None of my clothes fit me anymore!" " Im so sick of eating junk food!" And Im sure Brett it tired of hearing it... So I geuss its finally time to tell everyone the news... Im pregnant! Just kidding ! Hah! I really am kidding, but, it really is time to get serious. So I decided to try a different kind of bribe with Brett, and it worked! I told Brett if he started walking and excercising with me, go on a little weight loss/healthy eating challenge, once we meet our goals, I will buy him a Nintendo Wii!

So wish us luck on our new journery! I think its going to work this time!

Jazz Game!

2009-01-29T10:46:00.001-08:00

I got Jazz Tickets for Bretts birthday against the San Antonio Spurs! Thanks Alana! We had a great time. Even though we were only two rows away from the very top we still had great seats : ) We got pizza and ate in our seats while we waited for the game to start, soooo expensive! The stadium was really fun to be in, very different than the Utah State games here. There were so many people and it was so loud and intense and that made it fun! The game was really close at the end, but that Jazz lost by 5 points, oh well.

These boys in the seats in fromt of us were having so much fun! They loved screaming at the top of their lungs, DEFENSE, DEFENSE!

It was a fun evening! Maybe someday we can go again!

Salt Lake Lights

2008-12-30T13:20:00.000-08:00

It was such a cold night! But very beautiful!

Our tree didnt last very long

2008-12-30T12:10:00.000-08:00

So we finally got our tree all decorated, and it was amazing!

Here it is half decorated. It took about a week to get it done because one strand would stop working then we would have to get another strand, then another one would break.. you know how that goes...

........ and then a week later it died....... no more pretty christmas tree..........

But we enjoyed it while we could!

Our First Tree

2008-12-06T20:50:00.000-08:00

This is our first Christmas tree, and it is huge! It turned out much bigger than we expected but it is beautiful! We will post more once we get it all decorated!

Our Story

2008-11-23T14:43:00.001-08:00

Brett and I met last year in the "Old Farm" apartments. we both moved in there for the school year and we were next door neighbors. All of my roomates and all of his roomates quickly became great friends. We were the "I-3" and "I-4" buddies. We were always doing crazy things together! Well I always though Brett was pretty dang cute, but for some reason denied it. Finally he picked up on it and decided to ask me out on a date (through a text message.... nice) But I wanted to go on a date pretty badly with him so I ignored the whole " text message" issue and replied with a " yes!" We went to the Haunted Forest for our first date, pretty much so he could just cuddle up close to me. We went on our date and not much happened after that. We all went home for christmas break and when we got back I thought I should give him another chance, and the rest is history!

My roomates and his roomates liked to tease us that it started with a game of " Bigger or Better". You start out with something small like a paper cup or toothbrush and go around to peoples apartments and see if they have anything bigger or better to trade for it and you see what you end up with. So as we were playing this game, Brett accidently gave me a "good game".. so they called it... and our roomates loves teasing us about it. Here we are playing "Bigger or Better"

So I believe we started dating about two weeks before Valentines Day. Another thing we were constantly teased about was the issue of "Feeding Cole"...
My horses name is Cole and during the winter he needed to be fed each day so Brett would drive out with me to feed him. His roomates awlways assumed we used it as our exscuse to " be alone" which really wasnt the case at all,but they liked to think so. Heres Brett and his roomates Mike Barker, Brett Caldwell, Cody Caldwell, and Mike Koch... and Dallin Stephens( not in the picture)

So Brett and I dated for about 2-3 weeks and we still hadnt had our *First Kiss*. Ironically it happened while we were " feeding cole". Kind of a funny story... so the moment was so awkward and it was so obvious he wanted to kiss me when ha gave those puppy dog eyes but he just would do it! So I said " Just do it already!" and he did. And right as he fireworks were going off, a horse decides to pee right next to us. Very romantic.

Brett took me, my roomate Virinia and her friend Andrew down to his house to go snowmobiling, it was way fun!

Here we are at the Institute Dance I asked him to.

We continued dating until the end of the school year, and sadly everyone had to move out. I was moving in with some old roomates and Brett was moving in with some of his. His contract fell through and needed to find somewhere to love so he signed up for my apartments and on moving day we discovered we were next door neighbors again!

We had been planning a trip to California to see my family for a while and everyone kept asking me if he was going to propose down there. I told them all no because he was out of his element. He didnt know his way around, didnt know where anything was so it wasnt very likely that he would. Little did I know....

I had so much fun showing Brett around my home town!

I had gone ring shopping with my best freubd Erica a few months before we even left for California. Apparently Brett went ack and bought the ring a few days after I had gone shopping so he had the ring for over a month before he asked me!

On out last day there we planned a day to drive down to La Jolla Beach and the Temple. Brett proposed to me at the San Diego Temple on the platform that bride and grrom come out of from the temple.

The next day we left for Escalante UT, for my family reunion to share the good news! And to kick some serious trash in a football game!

2008-11-22T10:00:00.000-08:00

Well I decided to jump the bandwagon and get myself a Blog. Now I have something else to do to help me waste time on my computer, yay! Hopefully I will be able to keep up with this. I will be posting some picrures soon (as you all know, I have plenty of them)