3 Years!

Barrett and I celebrated our 3rd anniversary on Tuesday! We are continually grateful for the many blessings God has given us, including finding each other and our wonderful life since we were married. We also feel very blessed to have been sealed in the temple and love that we will be together for eternity. I love you babe and look forward to another year!

Happy Mother's Day!

moth·er/ˈməT͟Hər/

Verb: Bring up (a child) with care and affection: "the art of mothering"

I love this definition! And it truly applies to all the mothers I am close to and look up to: my mom, my sisters, my mother-in-law, both of Barrett's wonderful grandmas who have fully welcomed me into their families (mine have both passed away although they were wonderful as well), and my friends who have children (and I'm sure those who will in the future). For all those women out there, may we all learn "the art of mothering".

April Fools

Barrett walked into his office on Friday to this:

Click on the picture to make it bigger because it is an amazing foil job! (Notice the wrapped cup, fruit snacks, pen, flash drive, etc.)
People were coming into his office all day to see the desk, and his boss even had the hospital photographer take pictures of it. Barrett already has some payback ideas forming.

Barnes and Noble Art Show

I am currently in an art show at the Barnes and Noble in Midvale for the month of March with the rest of my teacher's students. Last Friday was the reception so I took a couple pictures of my paintings in the show.

I liked the idea of doing the same object in different perspectives, so I took one of my plates from home and painted it. I intend to hang them in my kitchen someday if I ever have room.

This is a sketch I did of a picture that was taken when we were in Hawaii. If you look carefully, you can see Barrett taking the picture, ha ha.

My art teacher, Emily Carruth Fuller, and me

Barrett's little sister, Sophie, was so nice to come with her parents to my art show. She even brought friends along to look at all the paintings. It was fun to have them there!

Book signing

I officially have my first autograph! The book club I am in recently read the book Matched by Ally Condie. My good friend and fellow book club member, Teresa, found her website and discovered that not only did she live in Utah, but was apart of a book tour with four other authors. So we made the trip to King's English Bookstore (adorable bookshop on 1511 South and 1500 East in Salt Lake) and then to the book signing at the Salt Lake Library. When we arrived we discovered that it was a panel discussion in addition to a book signing! It was great to hear about the authors and some of their methods of writing. After a long line of waiting to get our books signed we did eventually get a picture with Ally Condie. We all know once Matched is famous, which it will be, we will also be famous with our signed books. By the way if you haven't read the book, you should read it in time before the second book of the trilogy comes out on November 1, 2011.

Teresa, Hayley, and I were the members of our bookclub who could make it.

Scarves

Over the last few years I have gotten some really cute scarves but due to my lack of fashion ability and frustration at how to tie them I never wear them. Instead I see other people wearing cute scarves and decide to take out the box with my scarves in it only to get frustrated as I try to figure out how to wear them, eventually putting the box back in my closet. Well this last time I decided to try to wear a scarf again I searched the internet to find a good website about tying scarves and found one: http://www.scarves.net/how-to-tie-a-scarf/! So if you are like me and would like to know many different ways to tie the scarves you own then look at the great videos.

The Holidays

We love the Holidays! We especially love all the time we can spend with family and always feel blessed that we are so close to both sides of our family. After having family withdrawals over the last week it has been fun to blog and look at the pictures. I'll start from the beginning...

On Christmas Eve we spent most of our time with my family. Melissa and her family came up and Jeff and my parents were there as well. After eating dinner we went to see the windows at the Grand America hotel, which is where our first picture is from. We then went to see Christmas Street. We went back to my parents house to sing carols and read Christmas stories. After spending time with my family we made a trip to the Yates' house to open our Christmas Jammies. Christmas Eve has such a special spirit!

Barrett and I slept at our own house this year so we could open up presents together on Christmas. Just a couple pictures of our bigger presents.

We bought a new bedspread recently and I wanted colorful pillows to put on it since it is only gray and white. Well, Barrett made me this awesome pillow. I was way impressed!

After opening presents we went to my parents house to eat a yummy breakfast!

We were then able to spend the rest of Christmas Day with Barrett's family. We love being able to spend all the time we can with them! Barrett's parents gave him a new printer and me a sewing machine! So if anyone wants to start some sewing projects with me, I am in... They also got a ping pong table for Christmas so we had some intense games on Christmas as well.

Brittney and her family arrived from Las Vegas the day after Christmas, so we did presents with my family on the 26th.

My cute parents!

We spent New Year's Eve at my parents house with my siblings and parents. New Year's Eve with my family can be summed up in one word: games. We have tons of fun playing games together and spend most of the time laughing hysterically. We have played this drawing/writing game (now known as telestrations in the game world) for a long time. Between our crazy sentences, my immediate family's lack of drawing ability, and interpretation of bad drawings it turns out to be hilarious. We dubbed Barrett the best artist in the family and this funny drawing came from a warped sentence he was deciphering. Oh if only we had videos to show...

When midnight came we went outside to blow our horns and watch fireworks for maybe 5 minutes and then we all went to sleep exhausted.

Well, another Christmas and year has come and gone. But we always look forward to what lies ahead. Welcome 2011.