One of the best birthday's ever!!!

Melissa made my birthday so great last Wednesday. I woke up to:

Quarters in the shoe from the birthday fairy

and sweet luscious sticky buns

so after a wonderful morning and a long day at work, I came home and Melissa had bought me

my all time favorite treat from Aunt Omni
(Omniture sells this $1.50 item for 40 cents)

Then Melissa had me open some of my presents:

But best of all Melissa took me to where I proposed to her.
Central Park!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(don't worry, Melissa and I still love each other. The only reason we aren't touching each other is because there were no passerby's to take our picture so this is us taking each other's picture then a little photoshop magic, if you didn't notice.)

While at Central Park we watched a slide show of us and then blew out the candles that surrounded my cake.

This is Melissa singing happy birthday to me. I don't think she knows that I'm posting this video. But that's okay because I want everyone to know that she is the most fun wife in the entire world and I think this video shows it very well.

I just want to say thanks to Melissa for a wonderful birthday and for being the greatest wife in the entire world! Love ya babe!

breaking the rules...

7 months ago yesterday:

Just have to say how lucky I am to be married to Brandon.

I love you!

No more Mother's Cookies

Brandon and I found this out the hard way when we were searching for road trip treats and the Albertson's lady had to tell us the sad news. And that made us want them even more!

We continued with our road trip to Manti and enjoyed what the small town had to offer:

The Temple


Sunshine


Cute little shops on Main Street


and the Market

complete with the last bit of Mother's cookies.

Seriously. No joke. Of all places, we found some of the last remaining packages of these amazing cookies in Manti. You can only imagine how elated, excited, overjoyed, ecstatic we were.

We told all the people at the market how they should stock up on them like we did, but they thought we were crazy. Are we?

Winter Getaway!

These are the beautiful and fun young women of the PV 3rd Ward.

And I got to spend the weekend with them at the Heber Valley Camp.

Prizes for best combination in the world!

Second Runner-Up goes to

TADD FARMER!!!!

for his combination of Peanut Butter and Banana Pancakes!

Tadd's Prize is:
A $50 check in his name to Habitat for Humanity in honor of his Stockton to Malone combination.

First Runner-Up goes to

MAREN JENSEN!!!!

Mostly for her waffles and Ice Cream combination but I hear that the King Girls and Marsh Lake is an unbeatable combo. I am so excited for this summer to try that one out.

Maren's Prize is: An invite to Marsh Lake with the Kings this summer!

The GRAND PRIZE Winner for the best combination in the world goes to

NATE AND DIANA CRAGUN!!!!

For their combination of hot chocolate
and Grasshopper cookies

Other greats from the creative combo of Nate and Diana:
Ice Cream and Cake mixed
Fresh Breath & Kissing

Their Prize is:

Mexican Apple Soda!!!!

we ARE green

we love being green!

yes, we love to recycle.



yes, we love to ride our bikes and walk when we can.



and yes, we LOVE St. Patrick's Day!


we wear green.


we eat green.


for breakfast.

and dinner.

(for the record, chicken dies green nicely.)


and dessert.


our tradition "Green Mean Machines" tasted better when I was younger, but it was still fun to have friends over for this refreshing green treat.

What did you do with your tax refund?

Well, we debated about a TV for a week. Then we went hunting for couches. We spent many an hour reading reviews, asking all of you for your opinions, etc. By the way, many thanks to all of those who helped out. This is what we came up with....drum roll please.....

Food Storage!!!!!!!!!!!

Here we are at Macey's in Provo two and a half hours later and 87 dollars poorer but way richer in our food supply. We are hoping that the little money we spend now will last us months as we try to follow the prophets council and have at least a three month supply of food. Now, where to put it? Under the bed? Behind the couch, i mean camping chairs? We're not quite sure yet but we're excited to be "poor newlyweds" that have been abundantly blessed.


P.S. There really is a prize for last weeks post on favorite combinations. I will give you all one more week to come up with a good combo and the winner will be rewarded next week.

Placemats on a Saturday morning

I always got excited for Saturday mornings growing up because that meant we got to use really fun placemats at Breakfast. Brandon remembered that simple thing and made these very creative placemats in honor of our roadtrip we were about to go on (details in a later post). I never knew I could get so giddy over some paper placemats, but I guess there is just something magical about bringing back childhood memories.What are some of your favorite childhood memories?

Ahhh! The finer things of life

Just keeping up with my Wednesday/Thursday Post. Thought I'd share with you a little something that brings me joy. What a great combo, Apple Beer and Doritos. Just add friends and a sports game. And for those of you who can't read the fine print on the Apple Beer it says Non-Alcoholic. Everyone loves a good combination, you know like Bert and Ernie, Andy Griffith and Barney Fife, Brandon and Melissa, or brownies and Ice Cream. Let us know what some of your favorite combinations are. There will be a prize next Thursday for the best one.

or this one?

what do you think?

You'll notice in our next post that we are couchless. Our landlord's mother came back from her mission and took her couch with her. We are not in a huge hurry to get something, but found this one for a good deal. It's a microfiber, comfy couch. Do you have any recommendations about what is good? Prices? We have never bought a couch before so we are pretty clueless.

Simple Joys

Simple things that brought us joy this weekend:


#1 Seeing vacuum marks on our carpet for the first time in 6 months.

We finally broke down and bought ourselves our first upright vacuum.
Our little hand vac was just not quite cutting it.

#2: Enjoying some "Brick Oven Lovin" with Justin & Katie and the fam

So glad we got to see them for even a short few hours. Katie looked so cute 6 months pregnant!

#3: Taking a leisurely Sunday stroll around the Temple...without a jacket



#4: Bringing back some childhood memories by treating ourselves to these yummy things: