Halloween!

Happy Halloween, everyone!

To celebrate this year, Joe and I are going to be "that house" and hand out REAL SIZE CANDY BARS! No fun size here, no sir! I think we may have bought wayyy too much candy...then again, I don't think that was exactly an accident. Bwahaha.

In honor of the holiday, here is a clip from the movie I watch every October, Hocus Pocus!



Wasn't that fun? This movie gave me such an appreciation for the word "Amok."

In case you were wondering, Joe and I don't really have any cool costume plans this year. Or any plans, cool or otherwise. Although, I think we may go as Doctor Who and Amy Pond, if you even know who they are. Apparently I bear a resemblance to that lovely Scottish lass. I hope you all are better prepared with Halloween garb!

100,047 bonus points if you can name this obscure
Halloween movie! Hint, it's a Disney Channel original!

"Witch and ghost make merry on this last of dear October's days." -- Anon.

Awesomes

Sometimes you just have those days where you realize how silly you can be. And when I say silly, I mean something more like ungrateful, or ignorant, or self-centered. I am those things, sometimes in small ways and sometimes not as small. But anyway, today I realized that I have a lot of stuff to be grateful for, and I can find them easily if I just stop worrying about me and look around.

For example, I have a wonderful husband who is funny and super nice to me. He does the dishes every day. EVERY DAY. We have a chore-duty arrangement, but still. I do them now and then when I want to "be nice," but I should probably do them more often for him because he is awesome. Sometimes he fluffs my pillow while I'm getting ready for bed so it will be soft and poofy for me when I'm ready to sleep. He has woken up at 5:30 am to take the dog out every day for like a week, even though we're sorta supposed to take turns, AND even though he gets up for work 2 hours later. He does it so I can sleep. He does a lot of nice, small things to make me happy. And I can't remember him complaining about any of it. He is the best. 

I have an adorable puppy who is getting so good at listening to us and not biting our fingers off. Hooray for that! He was house-trained in like a day, he licks us (lovingly I assume) when he wakes up. He runs up to us when we come home. And today I watched a video that involved a pregnant woman crying about Star Wars {it just happens} and he came walking around the corner, looking very concerned. Yes, my puppy worries about criers. That's cute! 

I am healthy. What a great blessing. 

I have an adorable little house that has everything we could have wanted. Heating, cooling, a dishwasher, washer and dryer. Furniture to sit in/sleep on/eat on. Nice carpet. Nice hardwood. Nice tile. Nice neighbors!  An awesome ward. We aren't cold because we have blankets and hot chocolate, if we want. We aren't hungry because we can afford food and because we have awesome people who sometimes willingly feed us, just cause they can. We aren't bored because we have games and books and movies and shows and a puppy and friends. 

Speaking of friends, I have awesome ones. They call to see what's new in my life. They hang out with me and plan play dates and girls' nights and we laugh and have fun together. They have things in their lives that they worry about, or that are hard, and they still make sure that I'm okay. That is amazing. They are successful and working hard towards awesome goals. They are also caring, loving, wonderful people. They are great, great friends. {And gorgeous too! :)} Even the friends I have that I don't know as well are just cool people. Good people who try to be the best they can all the time. They're inspiring. 

And finally, and perhaps most importantly, I have THE best family ever. My grandparents stay in touch and want to know about my life. They show their love for their families and are great examples. My aunts and uncles are all pretty spectacular. My cousins are some of my best friends. They are hilarious and fun and always make me feel wanted. 

Just one of my amazing cousins!
Apparently I need to take more cousin pictures.

My brother is one of my best friends too. He always wanted to hang around with me even when I was kind of a jerk when we were younger {and maybe sometimes when we were older...} He always supports my efforts in art and writing, and sometimes he thinks I'm actually good at it. He is probably one of the main reasons why I keep trying to draw and write, in fact. He is funny and caring and has a good, loving heart. I always admired his way of showing his emotions without fear. I love my brother.

My dad is my hero. His willingness to serve and love everyone has always been super impressive to me. He is silly and smart and humble and works really hard. He makes it clear that he loves and respects his wife. He supports my brother and I in everything. The list goes on and on. I love my dad.  

My mom is a superstar. She has always done everything she can for her family, and her kids. She always cleaned up after us, fed us (and it was usually quite delicious stuff, in my opinion), bought us things we probably didn't need, but wanted, and took care of our pets even though we had promised to do it. She laughs and sings and smiles all the time. And to this day she makes sure to tell us she loves us all the time. She has done a million billion things. I love my mom.

My awesome family!

I'm starting to feel like I'm getting kinda braggy, but I mean it to be a list of "Awesomes" in my life. I hope I'll keep remembering all my Awesomes next time I complain about how I ruined my just-painted nails or how I have another zit or my hair is flat or I wish I had new shoes {all pretty vain things, on reflection} or something else silly and unimportant. Cause life is great, and no matter what happens there are always things to appreciate. 

Little Blue House

We bought a house. A little blue house, with a red brick driveway. How quaint is that? It is just over 1,000 square feet. It has a sprinkler system and AC. It has a dishwasher and a washer and dryer. It has arched doorways. ARCHED DOORWAYS, you guys. I am disproportionately delighted by those. It has hardwood floors in the bedroom. Actually, probably in all of the rooms, but the other ones are covered by carpet...FOR NOW. It has a beautiful backyard that is almost as big as the house is. Maybe bigger. Seriously, it's beautiful. And it has a garden. It has an awesome 76-year-old neighbor lady named Lola.

We love it!

Here are a couple of pictures:

Living room! Remarkable, truly. 

Other side of the living room! This is my favorite part right now,
because we just painted that blue wall (note the arched doorway!)
 and the baseboards, which used to be the same color
as the walls. It looks so good! Ah!

Kiiiitchen! It's like 4 times the size of the apartment one.
So great. And we have a TABLE!

The backyard. Sigh. Amazing. And leafy. 

That's all the pictures you get for now, because the other rooms are in a non presentable state. The office, in fact, will probably stay that way for a good many weeks(/months...)

Also, I got this amazing wingback chair for FIVE DOLLARS! For real! KSL is fabulous sometimes. I am going to recover it with no help whatsoever. What. So. Ever.

I am a chair!

Lies. Mom is going to help me. 

We also got this little terror. He's a (currently) 23 lb newfie-pyrenees puppy named Magnus:

Actually, he's pretty ok. I mean, just look at that white-tipped tail! 

Ah. Adorable, isn't he?

And to finish off, here he is cuddling with Joe. You're welcome.

Puppy likes him some tummy rubs

Cabining!

Much later than expected, here I sit to write about Joe's b-day trip with our friends Scott and Wendy to their cabin! Hooray for posts!

Here's the cabin! Ok, so it doesn't look like much, but how much do you really need? There are two stories, Joe and I and our friend Doug claimed the top floor, and the bottom floor was for the hosts, the kitchen, and....playing games! It was rainy almost the entire time we were there, so we did play A LOT of games. I always considered myself to not really be a "games" person, but I had so much fun! I have reconsidered games as an enjoyable past-time. I learned how to play Settlers of Catan for the first time, and despite losing every single round, I found it quite entertaining. We also played Monopoly Deal, which now that I think about it was also unknown to me before that trip. I love that game. And we also played HORSESHOES. Which, just so you know, I am a master of. Unbeknownst to me and the world, lurking inside me was a horseshoes queen, just waiting for her opportunity to rise and take her place in the ranks of accomplished horseshoes-ers. Who knew that throwing bits of metal at OTHER bits of metal could be so much fun?

That's Joe throwing his piece of metal. He was alright. :) Scott, on the other hand, has had way too much practice. That guy throttled us. Every. Time.

The other thing we did that weekend, besides playing games, was attempt to fish. I say attempt because it was beyond cold and I think one little fish was caught. But it sure looked pretty at the lake.

Mist-ical, no? (ha. ha.)

The men, fishing. I huddled up in the towels we brought
in case of swimming - ha! - and read my book. 

Joe eventually succumbed to the cold as well
and came to cuddle with me for warmth. 

We also celebrated Scott and Joe's birthdays which were both in the upcoming days that week. I already showed you the picture of them and the cake, so I'll spare you the repetition of the other nearly identical photos that I have.

And that was the trip! It was pretty fun, despite being drizzly, and we even saw a lurking moose on the drive up! You can't beat that, you really can't.