BIRTHDAY FUN!!!!

I am finally 20!!! No longer a married teenager. :)

This Birthday was epic! Thank you to Everyone who helped make it special!
A couple of days before my birthday my family took me out to dinner. We went to Texas Road House and let me tell you I will never chose that for my birthday again. I'm not a huge fan of people singing to me but at Texas Road house if it is your birthday they have you sit in a saddle and announce to the entire place that it is your birthday. Then everyone gives a big YEHAW! Sounds simple but I find such things so embarrassing and would rather not be the person in the middle or in this case the saddle. ;)
While at dinner my family gave me some very thoughtful presents. Ryan and Christine gave me a travel kit. It had all my favorite treats in it, a diet coke, and a couple of gift cards. I loved it, something so useful. Especially since Rob and I were headed for Vegas that very weekend.
My parents gave me a watch that I have been wanting FOREVER. It's not the exact watch I had wanted, it's SO much better. It's a Michael Kors watch and it's gorgesous. I love rose gold and have been wanting a rose gold watch forever. I LOVE it. :)

So the actual day started off going to work. When I got there my Dad pulled up with a gorgeous vase full of long stemmed Roses. He gets me flowers every year. He's the most thoughtful Daddy. :)

After that My wonderful boss brought in some packs of diet coke for me and also a Carrot Cake. :) So thoughtful and YUMMY!

After that I went to lunch with my mom, dad and sister in law Christine. We went to Costa Vida and it was of course delicious as always.
After that I headed on back to work and spent the rest of the day there. At five o' clock I left work and headed home to drop off my roses and cake and diet coke.
When I walked through the door and up my stairs to my kitchen I found my kitchen table covered in a huge gift bag and more roses. All from my adorable Hubby.
In those bags were some brightly colored Free runs (I've been wanting new running shoes for months) and some socks as well. I couldn't wait to wear them.
Rob had one more present for me but we had to go get it. There was a swim suit cover I had seen in the mall that I loved and had my eyes on for months. So we went to the mall to pick that up. the guy in the store was nice enough to give me a little discount just cause it was my birthday. :)
After the mall we headed off for the gym and worked out for an hour. For the first time I ran 4 miles in under a half an hour. :) It made me so happy!!! (I credit that feat to my new running shoes.) Now just to get five miles in a half hour.
After the gym we grabbed some dinner at one of my favorite places: Juice Press. A Turkey Avacado Wrap and Sunset smoothie was just what I wanted.
After grabbing some dinner we headed home to cuddle up, eat our food, and watch a few shows then packed up our bags for the weekend and then went to bed. :)
The next morning I went to work and worked until Noon and then Rob and I headed off for Vegas. It turned out that my parents were in St George for the weekend to see the Blue Angels fly. We stopped in St. George on our way down and ate dinner with my parents and had some fun shopping. In the process we talked my parents into coming down to Vegas after the air show to spend some time with us at the Forum shopping and then to spend the night at the same Hotel we were staying at. Before we left St. George that night my parents had a room booked and were ready to come to Vegas to have some fun.
We left St. George a little later than we had planned but didn't mind at all now that my parents were coming. :) We stayed at the Green Valley Ranch and it is a Gorgeous Hotel. :)  We Got to the Hotel a little late but that didn't stop us from going down to explore the place. The Casino was HUGE. Rob stopped off at the sports center and placed a few bets on some basketball games that were happening the next day. We also were super hungry so before heading up to bed we stopped at Fat Burger and grabbed some food.
The next morning we woke up late and then headed to the Strip. We went to pick up our tickets for the show we were going to see that night. We hung out around there for awhile and then met up with my parents for dinner.
We went to Lawry's for dinner. Oh my gosh it was AMAZING. I have never had such yummy food! It was a huge prime rib dinner. You pick the size cut you want of it and then pick to sides. Along with that they give you mashed potatoes and endless Yorkshire pudding. Needless to say I was STUFFED. But it was amazingly yummy. I could not have ever dreamed it tasting so good. AND the atmosphere of the restaurant was incredible. It was themed in the time of like the movie the Rocketeer. The waiters and waitresses all dress up and they actually bring this massive cart to your table and serve your food to you from that. It was such a cool experience. I felt so lucky to be able to eat there.
After dinner Rob and I headed off to our Show and my mom and dad headed off to the Forum to shop around. The show that Rob and I went to was the Cirque de Sole Mystere and it was super cool. They do some death defying acts. They had a lot of action and a lot of humor all mixed into it. The show didn't have any sort of story line but it was very entertaining.
After the show Rob and I headed off to the Forum. We walked around it for a while with my parents and when we got too tired we decided it was time to go to bed.
When we got back to the hotel, my parents got all checked in and settled and we discovered that they actually were put in the room right below Rob and I. How crazy is that?! The chances for that to happen in a hotel in Vegas is just not very big.
The next morning we packed up and headed for home. We stopped for some lunch in St. George and then headed on home. It was such a fun weekend I just did not want it to end,

I had an amazing Birthday, and Thank you to all those who helped make it special!!! I am truly lucky and blessed. :)

The New Life

Alrighty so it's catch up time here, I've missed a lot of holidays and things that have happened.
Halloween:

We decided to dress up as care bears! I was "Care a lot Bear" and Rob was "Grumpy Bear". We did make the costumes ourselves. We wore sweat suits we found out of Walmart, and then cut out big white circles for the tummies and ironed on the designs for what bear we were. For the hats we found beanies with ear covers that I cut off and then sewed them to the top of the hats and then we spray painted them the right colors accordingly. We had a lot of fun making them and even more wearing them. The night before Halloween and the day of was a CRAZY one. The night before we decided to make our costumes and carve two pumpkins. Rob did one and put "Mr. Potato head pumpkin" and I carved one that threw up pumpkin guts. They turned out pretty great if I do say so myself! I also made a spooky dessert for a contest for the party at work the next day. We also decided that night to go into work late and work a late shift due to the fact that work was so busy and we were over loaded with stuff to do and I had a Halloween party to throw that day as well. So we finished the costumes, dessert and the pumpkins and packed up blankets and pillows and headed off to work. I worked from about 1-2:30 and then went to go sleep in the conference room. Rob worked through the entire night and didn't get any sleep at all. The Halloween party was a success and lots of fun. Right after work we had a dinner at Carraba's with my family and then Rob and I went home to watch a scary movie and CRASH! :)

Next Holiday I missed is Thanksgiving. And sad to say I actually put up our Christmas decorations even before Thanksgiving. Here is our beautiful tree. This Thanksgiving we spent with my family. Ate TONZ and TONZ of delicious food. That night a lot of places opened at midnight for Black Friday so Rob and I last minute decided we'd head on up to South Towne mall and check out what they had. That night we ended up getting all of our Christmas shopping done for the family. It was so nice to not have to deal with any of the holiday shopping through out december except for my cute hubby.

Throughout these past three months of being married I feel like I've grown so much. I cook, clean, do laundry and take care of a dog. I wouldn't be able to do it without the help of my wonderful Hubby. He's so sweet to help out whenever I need him. I love it when I'm off doing something and I come back to all the laundry folded or the dish washer emptied, the bed made, or even my cute puppy washed. He's too good to me. He even surprises me with flowers, and when they die he surprises me with more. My table is never without a gorgeous bouquet of flowers.

SOO next up is CHRISTMAS!!! This being our first Christmas there was a lot of excitement for the two of us. The week of Christmas we watched a Christmas movie every night. :) I forgot how much I loved the Santa Clause with Tim Allen and Jingle all the Way, and our personal favorite: Elf. :) We went over to my parents house one night and we decorated Gingerbread houses. We had a couple competition, Rob and i obviously won! ;) We had a lot of fun doing that together. We both have awesome decorating skills. Every year we decorate these and then a couple weeks later we take them to a rest home and give them to an Elderly person that doesn't really ever have visitors. I love to see how their faces light up and how such a simple little thing can mean the world to them. It's one of my favorite things to do at Christmas time and it makes me want to do more things like that throughout the year. I think it's even something I'll do with my own children someday. 

Another Christmas Tradition that my family has that we do every year is we go up to the Roof up in SLC and eat dinner and then we walk Temple Square after to look at the lights and everything else. This was Rob's first year experiencing it. I would say it was a great success. The atmosphere up there is so electric and just the thing to get you in the Christmas spirit. 

So on Christmas Eve we went over to my Aunt Jean's house for our traditional Christmas Eve. I made Baked Potato Soup for it, and it was a success. Everyone loved the soup and Rob got to experiece the full Tanner experience on Christmas Eve. 

Later that night Rob and I had a decision to make. That decision was on when we should open our presents together. Our Christmas day Schedule looked like this:

9:00- Church with Rob's family out in Salem

10:00 to 2:00- Out at Rob's family for the morning

2:00 to 3:30- Nothing

4:00 to Whenever- Dinner with my family

So due to this crazy schedule we made the decision to open up our presents together at 12:01 AM. So when we got home from my Aunts house we cuddled up and watched Home Alone 2. It ended around 11:30 so we only had another half hour to go.  So we took a few little family pictures while we waited. 

I think it's safe to say this Christmas was the best of my life. It was so wonderful to spend it with my family and my new family. I especially loved spending it with my husband. He definitely spoiled me this Christmas. What girl doesn't love to get clothes and shoes and a pair of GORGEOUS Diamond earrings. lol This girl sure does! I'm very lucky and I realize it more and more every day that passes by. 

 

The day before New years eve I took it off from work, and Rob sent me off the morning for a massage while he went with a few guys from work to watch the BYU bowl game. After my amazing massage, I went to lunch with some of my girlfriends. We went to Kneaders and had ourselves a little chat. After that I headed on over to my Mamma's and spent some time with her. Ryan and Christine took off for a weekend get away so my mom was tending Emily. I had a lot of fun playing with her (As you can see with the photos) and so did our little Yucky. (Check out the little videos)

 After spending some time over at my moms I went home to get ready for a sleep over with a couple of my good girlfriends. Rachel :) and Melanie. We had a lot of fun like we used too and my sweet little husband went to Blockbuster and rented us a couple of movies. He got us Kung Fu Panda 2 AND my favorite Princess and the Frog. He also was sweet enough to make us some bacon wrapped weenies. They were definitely Yummy. 

LAST  But not LEAST It's New Years Eve and New Years. Rob and I decided that we would spend it here at home with eachother and make finger foods, since we are perfecting our Bacon wrapped weenies we also made some bacon wrapped chicken and they were both delicious. I made us some hot chocolate and we ate Yummy Thai Food. All while we watched some of Kung Fu Panda 2 and Dick Clarks rockin' Christmas Eve. Our cute puppy brough in the new year by sleeping and we brought it in by sunggling on the couch and drinking some sparkling Cider. It's been such a eventful year, I can't wait to see what the year of 2012 holds. :)

The Story of Yucky

This is my sweet new puppy Yucky!

The Story of Yucky is short and sweet. On my early morning jog on a Monday morning I spotted this raggedy little dog running around the street. I left him there thinking he belonged to a neighbor or someone a few streets away. Tuesday morning rolled around and I rolled out of bed for another freezing run. I saw the same dog around the same place. It was sooo cold I just couldn't handle seeing him run around out there anymore. So I picked him up and actually went around to a few surrounding houses and knocked on the doors and asked if he belonged to any of them. No one claimed him so I took him back home with me. Rob was getting ready for the day when I walked in. When he looked up and saw what I was holding his face was priceless. "What is that???" 

"Well... it's a Yucky dog..." And that's where he got his name from. We put up signs around grocery stores and the gas station next to our house. I asked surrounding neighbors if he belonged to them but now one has claimed him. 

He's a sweet sweet dog, and cute to boot. He learns quick and has trained well. He hardly ever barks unless we're playing with him. We love him and I just can't believe how lucky I got finding this one. We have our own little happy family! ;)

Honey Honey Honey Moon

For our Honeymoon, Rob and I decided that we would sort of split up our little vacation. We started off in park city and were there for Friday Night, Saturday, Sunday and we left Monday morning for Tahoe. After spending two days in Tahoe and then headed for SanFransico.
After taking off from the dinner, Rob and I headed back to our little apartment, dropped off somethings and grabbed a few last minutes things and then headed off for Park City. We stayed in the Marriott up there, thanks to Rob's uncle. He gave us his time share for those few days. The next morning we woke up to get some breakfast. We walked to main street and ate at a little restaurant there and then walked back to our Hotel. The next day Rob surprised me with a day at the Spa!!! We went to Amatsu Spa and it was amazing. The place was amazing and the treatments were amazing the massage the lunch after, the day was just spectacular. He's such a thoughtful and sweet husband.
So Monday morning we woke up super early so we could go to the car rental place and take off.
We stopped off at our place to change suit cases and then took off for Tahoe. The drive was long but so worth it. I love road trips with my hubby. We have so much fun and laugh and sing and joke and just have the time of our lives.


When we got to Tahoe it was late so we just hung out at the pool and then went to bed. The next morning we woke up and I had yet another surprise. It was another massage!!! I'm so spoiled. The second one wasn't as good, BUT I was so happy anyways to go. After the massage we went off to the Lake and tok some pictures and just sort of played on the beach. We then played a round of Mini Golf at the Magic Carpet Golf. Needless to say Rob kicked my butt. It was my first time in Tahoe so all of it was new and very exciting to me. We ate some Thai food for dinner (YUM :) ) and then went to see Abduction.

We took off for SanFransico on Wednesday morning and got there in about four hours from Tahoe. Again the drive was fun and just full of jokes and laughter. I had never been to SanFransico so I was just ecstatic to be headed there. We stayed in a really nice hotel in Lafayette just about twenty minutes outside of SanFransico. Our first night there we got in a little later in the day so we decided to stick around town and just hang out BUT first we wanted to see if we could sneak in a quick session at the Oakland Temple. SO we were on our way there and we had just gotten onto the freeway when we ran out of gas!!! The next exit wasn't for a little over a mile and it was all up hill. Poor Rob got out and started to push the car. He pushed us until we could park it on the side of the freeway and climb down an overpass to try to get to a gas station. The climb in and of it's self was a huge adventure. We had to climb down a huge rocky hill, scale a rickety chain link fence (Which I ripped my Favorite Skirt on) and then hiked it into the next town for a little gas can. After that we had to make the trek back to the car and do it all over again.
We finally made it to the temple but sadly we didn't make it to a session, but we walked the grounds and took pictures and looked at the gorgeous view of SanFransico night lights.
 The town we were in is called Walnut Creek. They had some really fun shopping malls. So our first night we hung out there, grabbed some PF Changs to go and headed back to the hotel to jump in the hot tub.

The next morning we headed off into SanFransico for the day. We first stopped off to Pier 49. It was chilly and windy but so fun all the same. We ate lunch at Boudin's. Sourdough bread bowls and yummy yummy soups. DELICIOUS! Then we walked the pier some more, walked past some shops, got some mini doughnuts to share (which were sooo yummy) and then we took a little ferry ride out to the Golden Gate Bridge and around Alcatraz. The boat ride was SO cold. That day right at the bridge is was super foggy and it felt like it was winter. Going around Alcatraz it wasn't all that bad, it sort of warmed up a little. After that we walked up to the Ghirardelli chocolate factory and walked through a couple of times for some free samples. haha They never know who's who in there and if they've seen you before. After that we hopped onto a cable car and I experience riding one of those for the first time. We took that cable to Union Square, did some window shopping there and then took a cable car back and headed back to the hotel for the day.

Day two in SanFransico we first hiked up to Coit Tower where we could see a lot of SanFransico. We took some pics up there and walked around and then took of for Lombard Street. Lombard street was actually really pretty, I didn't quite expect it to be so pretty. There were a lot of pretty flowers and bushes and it just looked awesome. We drove down Lombard street twice cause I loved it so much. After that we took off for The Golden Gate bridge. This day was really clear and really pretty so we had a lot of fun being able actually see everything out there and see the bridge not all covered up by fog. The painted ladies were the last thing to see on my list. These are the houses made famous by the show Full House. One of my favorites growing up. (mostly because there was a little girl named Michelle in it) The houses were really cool though, they were really colorful and just fun. I think it would be neat to live in one. After all that sight seeing we were starving and somehow I talked Rob into eating some Sea Food. So we stopped off at Pier 49 one more time and ate a Bubba Gumps. It wasn't as yummy as we were hoping but it was still fun.

After days of fun in the sun and spending time with one another we had to head back. We made the entire drive in one day. It was a LONG drive, about 12 hours. I stayed awake for all of it except for about the last hour. Good thing we had Sunday to sort of recuperate.

 A lot of people before we even got married tried to talk us out of going on a Honey Moon. Mostly for financial reasons, but we were smart and saved up as much as we could before and also we got some amazing deals on really nice 4 star hotels and ended up paying less than we expected for almost everything.
But all costs aside I think that even if it's just a small weekend up in Park City that going on a little get away is essential. That one on one time was so important and just kept that happy wedding glow going. We had a blast and just loved being with each other after having such a long engagement. It was most definitely worth it and I wouldn't have changed one bit of it for the world. To me it's the memories that you make that count.
I can't wait for what other adventures we have to come!