False Alarm

Last night Taylor and I shut off the lights and climbed in to bed around 10:30 like any other night. (I know we have to be the lamest young couple in the world) Well five minutes later I think that I am hearing some sort of beeping so I ask Taylor to go see what is making the noise. A minute later I get up and flip on all the lights and we realize that it is our downstairs neighbor's smoke alarm going off. All three of them. The biggest problem is that we know that our neighbors aren't home. So here we are 10:40 at night calling the man that owns our apartment unsure of what to make of this.

This isn't entirely relevant to this story. I just love this quote.

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He said that he would try to get a hold of the people the live below us, and if he couldn't them he would come over himself. Well twenty minutes later and he finally got here. This gave me plenty of time to think. A little bit too much time to think actually. What would we do if this did burn our apartment down? Thank goodness that we have renters insurance. If this place was to burn down right now what would I grab first? What would I be the most upset about if I lost it forever?

Truthfully there isn't all that much that couldn't be fairly easily replaced. I figured that I would probably want to grab my laptop and the iPad considering that I'm taking an online class right now, but really that is what I would be worried about grabbing? In the end I realized that the man standing in the room with me looking out the window to see if anyone was here yet is the most important thing that I would want to make sure I got out.

It is not the material things that matter to me at all. I could do without them, but I could never live without Taylor. He makes me so happy. He truly is the love of my life. I'm grateful for this little experience to be a reminder to me of the blessings that I have and the blessing of my sweet husband.

I'm not entirely sure what was going on with their smoke detectors, but I know that there wasn't a fire. I heard something about heaters, wiring, and smoke, but I don't know what happened. All that I know is that thankfully we still have our apartment, all of our stuff, and our happy as can be marriage.

Valentine's Wreath

I looked and looked on Pinterest to find a Valentine's wreath that I loved enough to make. I eventually found two, but one was too expensive to make and I couldn't find the things I would need to make the other. Right there in the middle of Porters I quickly decided I would do another that my mom had pinned. My inspiration was this wreath. I never actually read all of the directions that were on the page, but doing it my own way was less work in my opinion.

I bought my wreath at Micheal's on clearance for $3.99. I also got the ribbon at Micheal's for $2.40 after a 40% off coupon.

The other tutorial wrapped ribbon around the wreath, but I had 4 yards of ribbon and it barely covered a fourth of the wreath so I painted the front of it instead. It sucked paint since it was styrofoam, but it worked. 

I instead used the ribbon to cover the sides and the middle. I tried using super glue to attach the ribbon but you could see exactly where I put it so I went with some left over corsage pins from my wedding. You don't even notice the overlap of the ribbon.

I did the same thing for the inside of the wreath. I didn't have enough ribbon left to go around it twice to cover all of it so I painted the little bit that you could still see.

I grabbed the only wooden hearts that I could find at Porters and picked up some foam sheets at Walmart to cut hearts out of. The wooden hearts were $0.39 each and the foam sheets were a pack of 6 for $2.49. I only used 2 and a half foam sheets. I used my Cricut machine to cut out the hearts. The sizes ranged between 3 inches to 1 and a half inches. I was going to paint them, but once the paper was on you didn't even notice the small side of the heart that you could see. 

I used the wooden beads (I actually got for $0.99) and the spools to make the hearts more three dimensional. I probably should have painted the beads and spools, but I didn't think to when I was doing it. It isn't that noticeable anyway.

I mod podged the paper onto the hearts. Most of the paper cost me $0.99 a sheet from Porters, but I didn't use more than half a sheet of any one kind. They were also two sided so it gave me more options. I used hot glue to attach them to the wreath as well as to the wooden beads. I laid them all out in the order I thought would look nice, and then chose which ones would have the wooden bead, the spool, or nothing underneath at random as I went. 

 I LOVE how it turned out :)

This project was a bit time consuming because there are so many different steps. (Painting the wreath, cutting out the foam and then paper hearts, mod podging, and gluing) It is so worth the time and effort! I love that it is original, and that they can be made so that no two are exactly the same.

My marriage is not another statistic

When did the world decide that getting married young was such a terrible thing?

This question has been on my mind a lot lately, especially after seeing 23 Things to do Instead of Getting Engaged Before You're 23 going around Facebook. Yet an article titled 5 Good Reasons To Get Married While You're Young that was written a month earlier didn't make it once on my news field once.

 I was engaged at nineteen and married a few days after I turned twenty. I haven't been married for long, and I know that I'm not an expert on marriage, but I do know that it is the best decision that I have ever made.

There was a couple other girls that I knew that got engaged around the same time that I did. Some of these girls were even younger than I was while some were older. This seemed to spark an outrage on Facebook. I saw a lot of Why is everyone trying to grow up? They need to live their lives while they can. I also saw some I'm going to be responsible and finish college, and get a job before I get married.

Since when does getting married young make you irresponsible? I'm not sure if I will ever understand that opinion. I feel that you are possibly more responsible than others if you choose to get married at a younger age. You are choosing to put someone else's happiness above your own and live your life with and for someone else.

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The world is telling us that our marriages are going to fail. The divorce rate is thrown around as if the fact that 50% of marriages that don't end in divorce mean nothing. People are expecting you to fail, and I'm sure that there are even a few people who are hoping that it fails. One thing that I know for sure is that my marriage is not just another statistic. I will fight for my marriage. I work hard to have the marriage that I have, and I will continue to work for it for the rest of my life.

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The divorce rate is high in America. I know that. We all know that. That shouldn't stop people from getting married, and the divorce rate doesn't change all that much depending on the age that the couple is married. I would be lying if I said that thinking about it doesn't scare me, but I think that people often forget the percentage of marriages that do succeed. If 50% of marriages fail, then that means that 50% of marriages succeed. The marriages that succeed are better to focus on than the marriages that don't.

My mother got married when she was nineteen and so did my husband's mom. Nearly thirty years later, both of their marriages are happy as can be. Their marriages are very different, but they are both still thriving. There isn't one specific recipe for success. Just because their marriages are doing well doesn't mean that mine will be in thirty years. To me, marriage is all about wanting it to be good and work.

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The average age for getting married in America is 27 for women and 29 for men. Is getting married at these ages the secret to having a happy lasting marriage? No, I don't think that it is. I feel that these marriages are as open to risks as much as any other marriages are. No one can make your marriage fail except for you and your husband. No one can make your marriage succeed except for you and your husband.

My marriage is just that. It is mine. It is different than anyone else's marriage. I don't judge people who get married at 19 or 28 or 50 because it isn't my place. Their marriages don't have anything to do with me. If anything, I am rooting for them. I am hoping that their marriage will be great, and that they will be happy.

I'm not missing out on anything because I got married when I was twenty. My life is not over. It is just beginning. I now get to do everything with my best friend that I would have otherwise had to do on my own. I have some one to explore the world with, experience new things with, and to grow old with. I am not missing out on anything that would mean more to be than being happily married. I am getting my college degree while having someone there to support me every step of the way. I will find a job with the help of my husband. I will do everything with my husband by my side.

Here's to being married, young, and in love!

Randoms {2}

It only took me eight months, but I changed my name on my I-card. I think that my name is officially changed on everything!

We bought an decently nice elliptical for seventy dollars on Craigslist before Christmas, and I could not be happier with it. I figured that I'll start out slow and gradually work up to harder and longer work outs so I've been running on it every other day for twenty minutes. That may not seem like a lot, but oh my goodness it is a work out. I really think that this is something that I can stick with.

A couple weeks ago we woke up to a few inches of snow on a Saturday morning when we had places to go. Taylor went outside to start the car and take the trash out while I finished getting ready. When we both went outside I saw that he had shoveled a pathway for me to get to my door. So cute and thoughtful of him!

We're primary teachers! This is such a good calling for us. We teach some of the eight year olds. I'm pretty sure that we have all of the perfect angels out of the 178 primary kids in our ward.

We watched all of the kids I babysit in our tiny apartment while their parents had a Christmas party at their house. It was amazing how small the apartment felt when we had 4 kids and the two of us in it. We didn't even have enough chairs for them to sit on and color.

After staying at Taylor's parents for Christmas we couldn't find the charger for his iPad. We knew that it came back with us, but couldn't find it anywhere. This past weekend we went snowboarding, and when I went to put my boot on I felt something in it. Yep, the iPad charger was in my snowboarding boot and has been there for the past two and a half weeks. I couldn't believe it. 

the first mistake

So Taylor and I have been looking into buying a house. He has his (more than likely) forever job which means that Idaho Falls will be our forever home. We decided that both of these things meant that it was time to find a home that we could raise our future children in and own until we are old and grey. We want to stop throwing a couple hundred dollars a month down the black hole called renting an apartment, and instead put our money into something that would mean something to us.

So we started to look. Taylor happened to stumble on this company that builds homes in a neighborhood next to us and they had some model homes that you can go look at. We had nothing better to do this weekend so we decided to go look at them. And there was the first mistake.

How could you not fall in love and get your hopes up over a house like this?

It isn't that the homes were over priced because they cost the same as homes with the same bed/bath and what not that, but the problem was that we are no where close to being able to afford them. I knew that when we were looking at them, but I didn't think that they were that far out of our price range.

So I called our bank to get prequalified for a loan, and that's when the nice horrible man on the phone crushed my house buying spirit. Not only would a loan for any of those houses be out of our reach, but any houses within 50,000 dollars of those homes would be out of our reach. That was SO hard to hear. I'm sure the man could hear the sadness in my voice as soon as he said it.

If you're thinking dang this girl is young and should have had a clue before she started looking, then you would be correct. Maybe we are crazy to even be looking into buying a house when I still have two years of school left, we're not making a ton of money, and we're hardly even adults. We don't even have a clue how to buy a house for that matter.

But I'll be darned if I don't still try and make this work. I've googled the heck out of buying a house, and I am trying to learn what I can. I'm looking at houses that are actually in our price range, and I am adjusting my expectations. We might not be able to afford our dream home right now so maybe the house we buy will only be our "home until we can afford a better one" rather than our "forever home." It took a few tears and a talk with Taylor to accept this, but we will own a house.. hopefully sooner rather than later.

5 Study Tips for College

1. Study in the library. Better yet, study on the quiet floor in the library. You have too many distractions at home that will get in your way. "I need to write this paper, but I need to eat, clean, watch TV, and take a shower first." It happened to me many times before I learned to get out of my apartment if I truly wanted to get school work done.

2. Make to-do lists. Write down everything that you need to accomplish in the week. Once you know what needs to get accomplished break it down in to daily lists. You won't be able to get everything done if you don't even know what you need to be doing.

3. Listen to music while you study. It helps to block out distractions. Some people say that it should be classical music or other music without words, but I think that any kind of music is fine as long as you're not blasting it. Even on the quiet floor of a library you will have noise from keyboards and people coming in and out. Music will help you focus more on what you're doing than what everyone around you is doing.

4. Take a break. If an assignment is stressing you to the max and you just need to escape for a few minutes then go ahead and take a break. Check Facebook, look at Pinterest, go to the bathroom, or make a phone call. Do whatever you need to do to give your brain a break, but make sure that you give yourself a time limit. Once that time is up get back to work! A five minute Facebook break worked wonders for myself.

5. Do everything that you can to succeed. College is hard work, and you aren't going to be able to do well by doing next to nothing like you might have in high school. Go to class. Go to test reviews or anything else that your teacher offers.(Going to these also shows your teacher that you are serious about learning and your education) Do your homework. Take the classes and work seriously. Try your hardest.

Every snowboarder needs a skier

Taylor taught me how to snowboard last year and now going to the mountain is one of our favorite things to do together. It is an exhausting sport to take up, but snowboarding with a skier makes it a lot easier.

Standing up on a snowboard is no easy task, but Taylor uses his ski pole to help me up and it takes so much less effort. (It makes a big difference when you fall quite often so you have to get up a lot more than what a good snowboarder does)

I can rest my board in his skis while on the ski lift. It's amazing how heavy the board gets when you are holding it with one foot. 

I'm pretty sure that this is not a normal thing that a skier might do for you, but Taylor helps me get my boots on. He didn't even complain when I said that my sock was bunched up at my toes so I took my boot off again before leaving the lodge. 

We had the chance to go a couple days before Christmas and it was so much fun! I've gotten a lot better since last year. I made it down the mountain only falling once! That truly is impressive for me haha. I'm so excited that it is only the beginning of the season since that means that we be able to go many more times.