I love Iowa but...

I miss a few things in Utah.

Do you know what I want right now more than anything? Mexican food. Specifically Costa Vida. I want a grilled chicken burrito with pinto beans and medium sauce. Smothered please.

My second pick would definitely be Rubio's.

I would take almost anything from here. Which is very uncommon for me.

Los 3 Amigos. Trashy. Sooooo good. I'll take a #3 please.

Besides Mexican food I really miss Wingers. I know, I know, it's unbelievable there is not a Wingers close by.

I do love their sticky fingers. But my favorite thing on the menu? Sticky finger quesadilla. Yum!

And of course I miss,

All of which are not located in the Quad Cities. Bummer. There is nothing to eat out here. There is an Applebee's on about every corner. There is a Chili's. Which is ok. Not fabulous though. An Olive Garden. A T.G.I.F. And....... That's about it. No good Mexican places we found. The Mexican restaurants out here serve ground beef with taco seasoning. That is not Mexican. Not to mention repulsing. So I have been trying to think of ways to satisfy my cravings. I have found a few recipes I'm going to try. Hopefully they will be impressive.

Trevor.

As of Saturday, March 26 my big brother is officially engaged! I couldn't be any happier for him. It seems like it was just yesterday that we were throwing

 these at cars. 

Or that we were running to the kitchen Saturday mornings to watch

this. 

Or how I would for some reason let him practice 

this...

and this... on me.

And I could have sworn it was just the other day that he dropped me off at the mall

in this. 

I remember picking him up at the airport

from his 2 year service for the Lord.

It wasn't too long ago that we would play dress up in the mall

 i would do weird things like this

 and he would dress up like this. 

But now,

this brother of mine that I know and love...

Is getting married to

this gorgeous girl...

here.

Congratulations Trevor & Karin!

Love you both!

We moved

We now live in Davenport, Iowa and I LOVE it here, surprisingly. I was worried I was going to hate it. But the people are so kind, I love our location, and I love our new house!

Our new home.

 And may I add that moving across the country is not fun. We packed and loaded everything onto a truck and away it went. We were worn out and our long trip had not begun yet. It took us 3 days to load the truck and secure everything as best we could. 3 DAYS!?! Thankfully Warren was able to help us. I don't know what we would have done without him. Thanks Warren!

This is a good view of the top.

This is us, relieved the packing is done with.

Hoory for ABF! We will definitely be using them again.

Once our cleaning was done and we were checked out of our apartment, my Maddison and her lovely family allowed us to stay with them for our last night in p-town. I wish I would have gotten a picture of our fun. I got to have a slumber party with my bff AND my husband. I could not have asked for anything better for my last night. Maddison rocks my world. And I don't know what I would do without her. I miss her already! Maddison, thanks for letting us stay with you. You honestly made this A LOT easier on me.

The drive was LONG. I am happy we actually made it here. We met our nice neighbors across the street who helped us move in. They are wonderful! We got everything in and are finally settling down. I do feel funny living here. It seems so big compared to our old place. I don't feel old enough to live here.There is something about having 3 floors that makes me feel grown up.  I feel like I need to be at least 25 to live here, yet I'm only 21. I'm 99.9% sure I'm the youngest wife here.

I know lots of you want to see pictures of our new place, so here they are.

We actually have a place for our table....

Small, but new appliances!

We don't exactly know what to do with our basement. It's huge. And we don't have furniture to furnish it. I guess other Palmer students use it as a study. But since we don't have kids, Cory's study is upstairs. We are thinking about putting a treadmill down here... eventually.

Our Lanudry/Exercise/Craft room. We get our washer & dryer next week! YaY.

On a side note, yesterday we went to Sam's. We were standing in line to check out. I gave Cory a side-hug. I look up and notice the woman and her husband in front of us are grinning at me. From ear-to-ear. Why? I have no idea. It was like she had never seen anyone show affection before. Next thing I know, our checker asks us if we could wait to do that. Do what??? slightly hug? He was shocked to find out we were married. Strange right?

Cory had his first day of class yesterday. He is going to do great! I helped him get organized because he has got so much going on. It’s hectic. He is taking 9 classes and will be busy studying away for the next year until things slow down a bit. I am so proud of him. He is going to be amazing.

Love you honey!

March Craft

Ok. So I love wreaths/door hangers right now. So I went with another one for March.

I know this is a terrible picture.

I found it Here. I really wanted to add something to it though, so I found some stickers I really liked and added the "LUCKY."

Dec, Jan, & Feb Crafts

So...... One of my New Year's goals is to make at least one craft project a month. I recently discovered how much I love making crafts. In December I decided to start off a little easy and just make a hat for my sister-in-law Amber for Christmas. I made one for myself first to make sure I remembered how to still make hats from a loom. I bought some cute flowers to go with them. I think they turned out great!

I made Amber the one with the white flower

For my craft project for January I decided I wanted to make a Valentine's Day decoration. I found the cutest topiary HERE. It literally took me the entire day. But it was so worth it! I love this topiary with all my heart. I found the pot at Hobby Lobby. I did a few things a little different. Instead of buying a ball of the green foam and buying foam for the pot, I found topiary ones already made! I also didn't paint the dowel. I liked it unpainted.

The foam for the pot fit a little funny in the actual pot. So I put ribbon around the top and it worked out just fine! Isn't this the cutest thing you have ever seen?!?

Amber came over and made a craft as well. She made a really cute wreath.

My favorite are the doves. So adorable!

I love the Valentine's crafts so much I wanted to keep this going in February as well. I also wanted to make a wreath. There were so many options I had a hard time figuring out what type of wreath I wanted to do. I went with this... The tutorial is found HERE.

I had trouble with this one. I honestly could not find a Styrofoam heart wreath ANYWHERE! Even after various trips to multiple craft stores. So I had to improvise. I ended up purchasing a big rectangle of Styrofoam and cutting out my own heart. I do not recommend this. Once all the glue dried, it was very fragile and ended up breaking into 3 different pieces. I was super mad. I had spent a good amount of time on this wreath and I have to admit, a tear or two came rolling down my cheek. But with the hot glue gun and a little finishing spray used from my last project, I was able to fix it. It now hangs proudly on my front door. I am 75% confident it will not break again. But next time I'm going with the real stuff.

I hope I get around to making something good next month. It'll be difficult, but I can do it (I hope). And since Cory bought me a sewing machine for Christmas, the possibilities are endless! So look for my next project next month :)

Free Time!

I've always loved watching movies. When I was younger I absolutely loved going to blockbuster to pick out a movie. I got lucky if I could convince my mom to rent more than one. I had tons and tons I wanted to see. I even love collecting movies. Gray Whale is my greatest weakness. If I go in there, I almost ALWAYS have a movie in my hand if not three on the way out. The very thought of cuddling up in a blanket to watch a movie makes me happy.

It seems as though Cory has found a love similar to mine. Video games. Don't get me wrong, he's not addicted. But he loves playing his new racing game just as much as I love watching movies. This has been working out great. Of course we have our time together when we get home from work. We love each other very much. But once it hits 8 or 9 o'clock.... we gradually start doing the other things we love. So we both take our seats on our separate couches. He plays GT. And I watch Netflix. PERFECT. We set our limits. But we love it!

This week I started a new series. Desparate Housewives. My guilty pleasure. I love it. I don't know why I didn't start watching it until now. It's great.

I honestly love this time in our lives. Neither one of us are in school at the moment, so we don't have homework. Once work is through, we can just play. It's been SO fun. So for now, we are going to take advantage of every moment we have. Because this won't last long...

December Reminiscence

Over the past few weeks, I have had to say goodbye to a few things.

1.

I will never again walk these halls.

Wednesday December 15 was my last day.



2



I will never again run up and down these stairs.

The Provo Tabernacle caught fire and burned down December 17, 2010. I have many many memories here that I will cherous for a lifetime.

3.



And I will never again see him swim around.

And our dear Captain Barbossa passed away December 27, 2010. Cory gave his usual burrial words and set him in the dumpster. We are now down to two fish. 



But, we had a great Christmas. Cory got me a real tree.



We loved our tree!

It was so nice to have Christmas with just us. We started some traditions and grew closer to each other. Every day we feel more and more like a family even though it is just us two.
We had Christmas dinner with Amber and Warren. Everything turned out excellent!

New Year's was stellar. We played games with neighbors and family. We had a Meet the Parents marathon. We saw Little Fockers. We ate Rubio's and CPK. We stayed up until almost 4:00 am playing video games. We made some goals. And we snacked. A lot.

Amber made some great crab cakes.

Cheers Warren!

Bring on 2011!