wreath

I'm obsessed with this wreath. It's from this blog.
I daydreamed about it for a month before I finally got around to making it.
So I went and bought pom poms, because that's what it looks like, right?
WRONG! Somehow I didn't realize till I got home and started making it that it's made with
felt balls, not pom poms!
It's ok. This is the cheap version. I decided when we get a house {in a few years}
the real version is the first thing I'll make.

Thanksgiving

Eddie and I went up to Park City for Thanksgiving this year. It was weird being by ourselves without any family, but we had a good time. The only time I was really sad about it was right when we got to the restaurant, sat down to eat, and looked around to see everyone with their families. I got over it when they served our food and realized how delicious it was. Plus I was just happy to be with Eddie. I don't know how army wives do it. We ate at the Grub Steak, which was a good choice (made by Eddie). It had nothing on your Thanksgiving dinner, Mom, but it was still good.

Cart outside the Grub Steak. We're going to go back and try the steaks sometime. We didn't order them, but saw other people's and they looked incredible.

satisfied post-meal

We wanted to make our first thanksgiving special so we stayed up in PC @ Sundial Lodge

Around 9:00 eddie decided we needed some treats so he bundled up like crazy & headed to 7-11
(did I mention it was FREEZING up in PC? It was between -5 and 0 degrees that night!)

Then, around 11 pm I realized black friday was fast approaching. I've never been one to go out and brave the crowds- in fact I've usually thought it was a dumb idea since the sales don't seem that great. But, I got online and saw that the PC outlets seemed to be having good sales and figured what the heck? We're already up here. So we bundled back up and went to see what it was all about. Besides the 2 mile line of cars waiting to get into the outlets, and the fact that parking was impossible to find so we ended up parking down the street and walking, it was fun! It really was. There were so many people and everyone was acting like it was 1 in the afternoon they had so much energy. We found a couple good deals at J.Crew, and that's about it. It was a unique experience that I'd be OK if we only did once, but definitely memorable.

Notes from Eddie

Since technically this is my blog too (refer to the title) I feel entitled to add a few of my own comments here and there, mainly to clarify. I know many people are thinking that the ski mask thing I'm wearing is a bit overkill, but you'd be wrong. Seriously, it was so incredibly cold. My eyelashes had ice on them. A hand full of people at the outlets made comments that I had the right idea about the mask because their faces were frozen. I picked it up at Costco for $10, and I'm sure glad I did because it, along with an incredibly warm coat, made me toasty in the freezing conditions. That's ice on the outside of the mask! Also, a note about the coat. It's called the subzero. Usually I wouldn't take much for the name of something, but as I was in subzero conditions, I can attest that the coat really is made for the subzero because it kept me so incredibly warm. I don't recommend wearing it inside the stores though because it was a bit much when there are a hundred people in a crowded J.Crew store.

Thanksgiving was good, and even though it wasn't traditional, I'm glad I was able to spend so much time with Marianne. It'll be sad when she has to go back to school and I don't get to spend all day with her.

Oh one more thing... I want heated bathroom tiles in my house (the hotel bathroom had them).

proof
It says -3, but with the windchill it was more like -20.
2:34 am: when we finally got back in the car after a long night of shopping.

There was a window right above the shower into the bedroom. In the morning while Eddie was showering, he kept writing me notes in the steam.

Our one regret was not bringing our bathing suits!
This heated pool would have been so nice to enjoy.
It looks like a giant hot tub since there's so much steam coming off of it.

Thankful.

In honor of Thanksgiving, here are our top 10's!
(I wrote mine, then whited out the font so he couldn't see it. Funny how we ended up writing practically the same things anyway.)

Eddie's top 10 thankful list:

1. Marianne: This one is obvious, but really I can already see how she makes my life better in every way imaginable
2. My parents
3. The Gospel
4. America
5. Work and the ability to earn
6. The Future: I am grateful that I have many awesome things to look forward to
7. A warm home: meaning temperature and how cozy Marianne makes it
8. My warm puffy coat now that it's going to be negative ten in Park City (where we are going for Thanksgiving)
9. Good books/movies/television shows
10. Those moments when you finally succeed at something where you had failed before

Marianne's top 10 thankful list:

1. Eddie as my husband.
2. Our apartment. It's clean, cheap and cute. Perfect for our first home.
3. The scripture study and prayer we have every night.
I've never been regular at this until we got married. Hopefully it sticks.
4. The other ritual of naming the top 5 things we love about each other
every night before falling asleep. Favorite part of the day.
5. Our families.
6. My education and the chance I have to get my masters.
Something I always dreamed about but didn't know if it would really happen.
I'm thoroughly enjoying my classes this first semester.
7. My parents' love and support for me. Especially with school, and making possible all the experiences I had before I got married.

8. Our health.
Now that it's freezing outside and it's getting harder and harder to go to the gym,
it's definitely a goal of ours to keep health a priority.
I'm grateful we have healthy food to eat and clean water to drink.
Oh, and diet cranberry juice.
9. Friends.
One of the biggest changes that came with marriage was a decrease in the time I spent with friends. It's something I'm not used to, being that I was single for 24 years and got quite used to "hanging out" at all hours of the day. But I've realized how big of a role my friends have played in my life and I'm grateful for them.
10. Our matching coats.
At first we thought it was just a fun thing to get together, but our puffy coats have already proven their worth x1000 in this arctic Utah winter!

It turns out

That just because you get married doesn't mean the holiday gift boxes come to a halt!

Thanks Mom~
Receiving this was by far the best part of the week.
That, and welcoming Eddie home from being gone all week. Glad that's over.
It also turns out that going on a cruise after only a month of marriage, and leaving your new wife at home, is an awful idea! I'm glad he had a good time but I'm going next time.
(For the record he won it through work.
I was invited but couldn't take off school anymore this semester)

She included all the good Christmas movies. You know, those on Lifetime and Hallmark. All the ones we watched in her bed on Sundays after church for years. Eddie's a good sport and watched A Boyfriend for Christmas with me today... :)

Also, this past week while Eddie was gone I went up to my grandparents. My grandma told me about this fabulous simple rice pudding recipe that calls for 3 ingredients: rice, pudding and cinnamon. Well I made it and it was incredible! So easy. I made 2 large packages of the stove-top vanilla pudding (not the instant kind) 1.5 cups of rice and a little cinnamon. Try it! Thanks for the idea, Grandma. My kinda recipe.

Paige

Let me introduce you to one of the greatest people on this planet, Paige.

She's one of the best friends I've ever had, and when I think back on the good times throughout my college years, she's in most of them.
She has incredible characteristics that are really hard to come by.
For instance, she's extremely loyal and very patient.
She doesn't get irritated easily and is easy going especially when I'm not.
I can't even list all the times I've been freaking out about who knows what, I call her or go see her, and after just one word she's already saying the perfect thing to calm me down
and reassure me that whatever it is isn't that big of a deal.
It rules, everyone needs a friend like her.

She's hilarious and so fun to be with- I think that's the first thing that drew me to her.
Sophomore year we lived across the hall together in Belmont-
one of the best things that's ever happened to me. Seriously.
That entire year was a ball-
we did things like go to Los Hermanos at 10 am for tamales,
pretend to go to the gym but really go to Hogie Yogie for cookies & cream shakes,
drive around and look at all our favorite houses
(which resulted in us both getting our real estate licenses),
lounge on her green couches in our sweats,
talk about how our crushes really did like us,
go on long drives,
go to all the baseball games,
oh yeah, and take off school for a week to go campaign in Asheville, NC.

She's always down for anything and has the best ideas.
She's smart and a great conversationalist-
she could have a meaningful conversation with
the homeless and the President and everyone in between.
But she also understands the real value of a manicure
and has the closet every girl dreams about.

She's the most adoring aunt I've ever seen
(Eddie and I love to talk about baby zach)
and her kids at school are obsessed with her.
I'm so glad I got to witness her first year of teaching,
those kids still facebook message her on a daily basis.

After we lived across the hall from each other at Belmont we lived apart for 3 years
then finally got to live together in the 3030
which was a dream come true.

Another great thing about her is how supportive she is.
She's always been me & eddie's number one fan which has meant a lot to me.
Eddie thinks she's just as great as I do.

I really could write forever about how fantastic she is and
the memories we have, but I'll show you our history in pictures instead.

Sophomore year we went to the And1 game and met the players

one of her birthday dinners at pf changs

Asheville, NC
(must have had an early morning)

she shares my love of delicious, cute cafes
and guru's

she has the best costumes, a la anna nicole smith

she loves taking drives up the canyon and
shares my love of photoshoots

roomies at last

the genius idea of entering the santa run was hers

She's real thoughtful and an impeccable party planner.
This is the bridal shower she threw me-
everything was so pretty I couldn't get over it

She's so helpful and selfless.
She came along when we had our engagements taken
Wonder how we were able to balance in that canoe?
Notice the arm right by the boat motor...

our engagement session lasted over 2 hours...

If it wasn't for her, I would have been a complete
stress-case the morning of our wedding.
I could trust her with my life, let alone my wedding.

I love you girl.

Apartment 206

Christmas decor~

Haynies- Thanks again for the stools. Best part about the apartment!

Our 600 sq foot apartment is so cozy.
Every time we come home I say "Eddie, look how cute our apartment is!"
We can deep-clean our whole place in 20 minutes.
Eddie dusts and does the floors, I vacuum and clean the sink and tub.
I'm so glad I married someone so clean & helpful.

Come over! I'll make you any kind of pasta you want.

Sundance

The weather was too nice not to.
And my hair was too annoying flying around in the wind
which is how my scarf ended up on my head.
but by the end i was digging it.
Man school has been cramping my style in terms of
spending all my time with Eddie; today was perfect and lazy.