To share it with

So as Lisa has described our last week it was a bit crazy and a bit fun. I have noticed something as we go along this thing we call Marriage. It's about sharing. I had always heard the phrase uttered that in marriage you have someone to share "it" with. "It" could be an experience, a child or children, a hobby, etc. But my experience with Lisa is really the first and most active relationship I have ever had. We both play an active role being engaged in what is in each others lives. It's refreshing and very rewarding to say the least. But to go along with the bad, stressful, or unpleasant things that have transpired this last week; it would be nothing to me if I had to deal with it alone. It means everything to me to have someone to share it with, even especially if it was bad or unpleasant. Even with not all of the Yay's or Nay's listed there were some of Nay's if you will where I would just laugh and giggle my way through it. Which I am quite happy I did. While Lisa did not laugh at the Nay's like I did she would just roll her eyes at me like she does and call me a ham or turkey or whatever deli meat it is that she calls me. I laughed mainly in part because I realized that whatever Nay was happening that I was out of control really, and luckily I was in company with the one person who makes me the most happy in all the world. So why should I care if it was a stressful or bad experience? Hopefully I can have more instances of this.

So just like our windy reception, it was memorable. Because it wasnt easy and because it was difficult or unusual it was a experience unique to us alone, and for us alone in some instances to share. In brief, it was our adventure, and it still is everyday. I absolutely love that. Good or Bad. It's ours. Whether it is moments you share later with friends on a blog or not. It is something that you don't have alone but something that exist forever in memory with someone you hold most dear. I was home alone for a whole day and the best way I could describe it to my father was "Empty". The house was just empty, my schedule was just empty, and I had nothing to share with anyone. When it came time to kneel down for prayer before bed I realized it was the first night we had been married where we did not pray together. That and everything else was difficult but caused me to see and evaluate how Full my life because of her.

Now I don't mean to be sappy, I mean to be quite frank and real about this. If your married and your reading this, maybe you have already figured out what I have or maybe you havent. But I say regardless that whatever happens in life, Good or Bad, share it with someone you care about.

Yays & Nays

This week's edition of "Yays & Nays"...

Yays:

Family in town (both Bruce's and my own)
Pie-n-Beer day was a massive success
Fun new pie recipes
Saw my bestie for a couple days down in Utah
Got to spend quality time with Bruce
Ate good food over the weekend (Mi La Cai and The Pie)
Harry Potter mini-marathon
Wedding planning with the bestie
Mechanically inclined father-in-laws
Super helpful brother-in-laws and cousins

Nays:

Jury Duty (so, so many frustrations this week from this one with scheduling and other things)
        for example:
                   a case that hit far too close to home and caused an emotional breakdown
                   having to call in later in the week to see if I potentially have to go in again...with no real certainty
                   having to go back in on a day I should have been traveling...but being dismissed after an hour
                   having to go back in tomorrow....gah!
A car with no A/C in the summer
Being away from my hubby
Wedding craziness
Being hot and tired
A car that decided to spaz out and die on the way home from Utah


Here's hoping for a better week...

Fingers crossed!

Painting is for the birds...

Every now and again when I am bored, I will pull out the watercolors and paint a picture.

Which is slightly funny to me, because painting was never my favorite thing in all my years (7 of them) of art classes.  Definitely not my favorite.

Anyway, what is even funnier to me, is the fact that recently I have only really been painting birds.

I like birds, sure.

But not enough to truly justify the repeated painting of them.

Except for the fact that there are so many different kinds, colors, shapes...yeah, they always pose some new challenge (which is why some of them look a little funny).

So I'll post the pictures of them below... 4 of them were done in the last 2 days, and I'm even posting the ones I really don't care for.  Yep.  That's how much I love y'all.

Mint Chocolate M&M Cookies

Bruce and I had a ton of candy left over from our wedding.

Like, literally, a ton.

Okay, not literally.  But it was a lot.

So we decided to make cookies with some it, and we gave away the rest of it.

We ended up making some Mint Chocolate M&M Cookies, which were frankly delicious, so I'm going to share the recipe below.  Enjoy!

Mint Chocolate M&M Cookies

2 1/2 c. flour

1/2 c. plus 4 Tbs cocoa powder

2 tsp cornstarch

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 c. butter (room temperature)

1 c. packed brown sugar

1/2 c. sugar

2 eggs (room temperature)

1 1/4 tsp peppermint extract

1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350.

Sift flour, cocoa, cornstarch, soda and salt together to ensure ingredients are not clumped.  Set aside.

Cream butter and sugars together til fluffy.  Add eggs and extracts and mix til smooth.  Add dry ingredients.

Stir in M&M's by hand to avoid crushing them (ours were a mint green color and looked awesome against the chocolate cookie).

Drop by spoonful onto greased cookie sheet and bake for 8 minutes.

Try not to devour them all by yourself.  (We had to give most of them away to avoid eating them all)

Wishes do come true

When I woke up this morning, I told Bruce that I wanted it to rain today.

And not just normal rain, I wanted a torrential deluge!

But today turned out to be just as sunny and hot as it has been recently, topping out at around 91 degrees.

And then...the clouds rolled in around 7:00pm, and it happened!

I got my torrential downpour!

It poured buckets and buckets for probably 10 minutes, and then cleared up and blew away.

But I still got my rain.

Sleeping

People say that sleeping in the same bed with their new spouse is an adjustment.

This is definitely true.

There is extra body heat, limbs jutting into your personal space, snoring, and extra movement from another restless sleeper.

I was aware of and mentally prepared for all of these things.

There was one thing I was not fully prepared for however...Bruce is an active sleeper.

An active sleeper in my book, is someone who moves around, talks, or actively does things in their sleep. I am actually an active sleeper at times.

Bruce is an active sleeper...often.

I have been woken up several times to him doing and saying some very interesting/random/weird/crazy things, and I have to tell him (and sometimes creatively convince him) to come back to bed.

Some things you just can't plan for...

Trips

Bruce and I got back a few hours ago from a short visit to Yellowstone.

Yep, we went again!

This time we actually camped in the park, at a campground in the vicinity of Yellowstone Lake.  I haven't been camping in a couple years, and it was fun to break in some of our new camping gear.

We spent the majority of the day in Canyon Village, which is where the "Grand Canyon of Yellowstone" is located.  We went on a number of hikes (of varying lengths and difficulties) over the course of the day, and the canyon was gorgeous!  Truthfully, breathtaking.  Big fan of nature.  Big fan...

After the canyon, we went to Norris, where we walked around and saw a number of hot springs and geysers, some of which were super neat.

By the end of it all, we were tired, hungry, and sunburned, and we decided to head for home.

Now all we need to do is go to bed, meet Kelly and Vlad for breakfast in the morning, and write our talks for Sunday (yeah, we got asked to speak about an hour ago...I am less than jazzed).

At least the majority of the day was a success!

Weddings!

So, my bestie is getting married!

That's right folks, Kelly is getting hitched some time in the next 3ish months.

I am so happy and excited for her, and Bruce and I are excited to meet her fiance Vlad (no, not his real name) on Saturday.  Frankly, I think Bruce is more excited to see me give this guy "the talk" than he is about anything else...well, that and the fact that we're meeting over breakfast...he's excited about breakfast too.

But yay!

It's fun that we'll be doing this whole newlywed thing together.

My fingers are crossed that things will go smoothly for them with everything they have to plan and deal with for the next little while!

I don't think I mentioned that my sister-in-law is getting married in October too!  Holy wedding season, Batman!  I am so thrilled for her, she's got herself a great guy, and we're all so excited for them (maybe not for the fact that they will be living in Alaska, but aside from that... much excitement)!

Bruce's favorite poem

Teaching the Ape to Write Poems

James Tate, 1943

They didn't have much trouble teaching the ape to write poems:
first they strapped him into the chair, then tied the pencil around his hand
(the paper had already been nailed down).
Then Dr. Bluespire leaned over his shoulder and whispered into his ear:
"You look like a god sitting there. Why don't you try writing something?"

Cannonballs and the completely uninspired

Hello friends, My names Bruce,
Just checking in again.
Today had some highs and lows.
Today at work I bought 2 model rockets and a launching pad for them both and I was pretty excited for Lisa and I to go launch one off today. However, this did not go well. In fact, it didn't go anywhere. I think I broke the igniters or they didn't make contact with the engine, I don't know. So to be continued there. When we got home from out failed rocket test we made dinner. Lately we have been cooking out of a cookbook written by six sisters who hopefully kept their day job. Cuz thus far the recipes have been disappointing. I thought I would take a moment to post a picture of my wife's comments written next to the recipe.

Brutal that one, yet it shall forever remain as a reminder, just to not and say we did. Lisa is a clever one though, I'd probably forget how blah it was and just cook it again, but not this one, nah.
After dinner we went to the Ammon Pool. We joked around that because it was Monday we would see some FHE's there, oddly enough our old singles ward was having their FHE there this evening. It was good to see some familiar faces. I took this time at the Ammon Pool to do some big cannonballs; as it turns out I suck at diving. Thus, I stick to what I know, which is making a big splash.
And after some froyo, we are back home after having had a fun filled day. So despite the completely uninspired, I'd say we still know how to have fun. That is all.
Note: Lisa may correct some punctuation in here, I love you honey. ;P

Sharing is Caring?

SC is getting so big!

His most recent favorite things are babbling, scooting across the floor, hissing, waving bye-bye, and sharing.

The only problem with the sharing one is that he decided to share his cold with me.

Luckily, I can take drugs for it.

Unluckily, I feel like I'm constantly on the verge of tossing my cookies this morning.

Instructions

I was perusing some recipes today, and I realized that I haven't been quite as adventurous in my cooking endeavors as I have been in the past.

My recent delving into uncharted recipes has proven mundane at best, they left me disenchanted to say the least...making me less than excited to attempt anything outside my repertoire.

But I am determined to prevail!

I want to try more new recipes. Exciting recipes. Recipes with flavor, pizzazz, oomph, substance, color, and wow-factor.

We'll see how this goes...

Halfway

Hey y'all, guess what!

It's July.

Yeah, I know, crazy right?

We are halfway through the year already!

I'd ask where the time went, but since I spent all that time anxiously awaiting my marriage to Bruce, I know exactly where it went.

Here's to all the glorious happenings to come in the remaining six months!