It's Been a While...

Well it's been over 2 years since the last time I posted something in my blog. My husband fixed my computer, so I feel the need to do a little catching up. A lot has happened within the last 2 years but to make it a little easier, I will focus on the highlights:)

1. We bought a house in Cedar City.
2. Carter received his Bachelor's Degree.
3. We have a new addition to our family named Max. (He's a Maltese-Poodle and most likely the most spoiled little dog ever!)
4. I got to travel to Jacksonville, FL to my job and was able to go to Disneyworld for the first time!
5. I was chosen to travel to Columbia, South America for an entire month to help train other supervisors.
6. Carter finally graduated with his Master's in Accounting!
7. Carter was hire for the Utah State Tax Commission.
8. We moved to Ogden, Utah and we love it (although we both have to commute to Salt Lake City, but we enjoy where we live)
9. I've lost 34 lbs!
10. We bought myself a BEAUTIFUL Baldwin Grand!!

Life has become more relaxed and I think that we are happy where we are right now. So I guess that this gets me a little caught up on what has been happening in our lives, and I promise that my blog will be updated more often than every 2 years!

Happy Birthday Honey!

Feb. 3rd was Carter's birthday. Nothing special, especially where he had to write a paper in between dinner and cake. I felt bad that he was stuck writing a paper, literally his whole birthday, but that's school for ya- I guess. I made him a cake. And sang to him. Have you ever sang "Happy Birthday" to someone by yourself? It's kind of awkward ...lol. Carter got a bike a couple months ago and I got the camera, both WAY more money than we should have spent, so those counted as our Christmas and birthday presents.

Nothing incredibly special or important has happened since the last time I posted, except that we have finally moved out of our apartment into a house. OK, so I guess that is pretty important! :) There's several things that are great about this house compared to the apartment we were living in. 1. NO MORE NEIGHBORS!!! It's so nice not being woke up in the middle of the night being able to hear conversations clear as day! There was even a particular night when they were watching Grease, and it sounded like the movie was playing in our room! I was even singing along...ha ha. 2. We have more space. 3. We finally can use our grill that we got for our wedding 1 1/2 years ago, that has been sitting in a storage space. 4. I have a washer and dryer!!! Now this is a HUGE thing because I have been going to a laundry mat for the past 4 years. We save money and time with that! The other nice thing is that when you find a hair on your clothes, you KNOW it's yours.... lol... I know... gross, but it's true! 5. We have a dishwasher. 6. We lucked out, this house is pretty darn decent and it's only $50 more than what we were paying for the apartment.

Life is going great. I'm trying to have a better attitude and outlook to life, and to be honest, I feel happier. I love my husband, we both have good jobs, we're in a house, and there's not many things that we're too worried about right now. If something does make a bump in our road, we'll get past it without looking back. Life is for living, and I plan to do just that!

Michelle's Bridal Pictures

Since my sister pretty much refuses to make her own blog, I wanted to post some of the pictures I had the privilege of being a part of. My brother actually took the photos and it was the first time I was able to sit back and help with the other challenging part of photography.... the posing. It was really fun to be a part of it and I think I was able to learn a lot from my brother. Here are a few that are my favorites.

The whole day we were taking these pictures, I had the hardest time realizing that my little sister was getting married.... I guess she'll always be my 10 year old annoying little sister to me forever in my heart :) Love you Michelley

My Sister's Wedding

So like I said in my past post, I would love to start seriously getting involved with photography. I was playing around with this photo from my sister's wedding, and I thought it ended up really well! This photo was actually taken with just my regular little digital camera, but I was more working on the editing part of it. I think I may frame this and give it to my sister for Christmas... so Michelle... if you see this- act surprised :)

A Great Thanksgiving!

So for Thanksgiving we went up to Provo, Utah to spend time with Carter's family. It was nice to spend time with them. In the morning we went to a field around BYU Campus, had to hop a fence and I watched Carter and his brother Rob play a little football. In the afternoon, Carter's mom picked up Carter's Grandma and I was able to visit with her. She's not doing so well anymore, but I'm glad that I was able to get to know her 5 years ago when she was a lot better. She reminded me a lot of my Grandma Dickey when she was still alive, so fun and full of life. 5 years ago, she was the first one on my husband's side that I grew to love... and at that time I wasn't even dating Carter. It was so hard to see how hard of a time she was having, but I'm still glad she was able to come. We stuffed ourselves, and unfortunately had to drive back to Cedar City that night. While we were there, his brother informed us he was selling his newly bought camera (only 4 months old). Naturally, I immediately looked at Carter with my "puppy-dog" eyes, and he gave the "ok"! I was SO excited! I had been looking for a SLR Digital Camera for a LONG time now, and I just could never justify spending $1200+ on a camera, so I always just put it back to my "future wish list". Luckily, it was a price that both of us knew we COULDN'T refuse. I am so excited to be able to focus more on photography now that I have a camera to support it. So this is considered my Christmas and Birthday present for this year. This is a picture of what it looks like. Isn't it beautiful? :) Today, after work Carter asked me, "So where are we going tomorrow?" It just made me smile, because he knew we were going on an adventure so I'm able to use my camera. I also found my Adobe Photoshop Elements today, which I have been looking for, for literally OVER a year! It's been an awesome couple of days. I hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving!

Bryce Canyon National Park

Today, Carter and I decided we needed to take a little break from Cedar City, so we decided to explore Bryce Canyon National Park. We are so lucky to live where we do, because we are surrounded with National Parks that people will travel around the world to see. Bryce Canyon was about 1 1/2 hours away, which wasn't too bad, but I was more excited that although I have lived in Utah my entire life, this was one National Park that I have never been to. We got there when the sun was just starting to go down, so we didn't get to spend a lot of time there, but it was one of my favorite times to take pictures, so worked out just fine. This is one place that I want to definitely come back soon! It was so pretty!

Husband Tag

My cousin Marylinn "husband tagged" me on her blog-

5 things Carter loves:

1. ME!

2. Fishing

3. Old Cars and Motorcycles

4. Exploring new places

5. Anything with sugar

5 things on Carter's "to do" list:

1. Finish School

2. Learn how to fly fish better

3. Pay off our debts

4. Go to Europe

5. Make lots of money :)

5 Foods Carter enjoys:

1. Egg salad sandwiches (gross)

2. Sauerkraut casserole ( sounds gross, but is absolutely delicious)

3. Pumpkin Pie

4. Chili

5. Seafood

5 things you might not know about him:

1. He pops his toes right before he falls asleep

2. He's actually a pretty good cook

3. He loves ALL Pixar movies.

4. He wishes that he could harmonize when singing.

5. Wishes he could grow a full beard.

5 places he has lived:

1. Alabama

2. Ohio

3. Indiana

4. Price, Utah

5. Cedar City, Utah

5 Quirky things about him:

1. He likes to make funny faces in the rear-view mirror while driving....lol....that one always makes me laugh!

2. Likes to save ALL toothbrushes (even though he will never use them)

3. He usually refuses to take medicine if he's sick

4. He opens every piece of mail with a letter opener, even though he KNOWS it's junk mail and he'll be throwing it away anyway.

5. Never can stay with one "flavor" of deodorant, or soap. He has to try the different kinds every time.