I know many have wondered if we are still alive. It has been over a month since our last post. We are alive, we are just busy. Here is an update.
Mark is still working for Taylor Electric and he loves it. He is currently working on the new high school in Heber. I haven't worried about him working up there until the snow started to fall. I guess I'm just a little paranoid about that canyon with snow and ice. Luckily Mark car pools with some guys from work so he is not driving the 2 wheel drive truck up there alone.

I am preparing for my last week of teaching before the much needed Christmas break. I just want a few days to myself where I don't have to be teacher or Mrs. Curtis. I am still enjoying teaching for the most part. I will admit there are some days that I want to quit and be done but I'm hoping these feelings are just because I am a first year teacher trying to get the hang of this.

For Thanksgiving this year Mark and I headed down south to be with his family. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner at his parents. It was my first Thanksgiving away from my family. It was a very Happy Thanksgiving.

Mark and I got up early the following Friday to participate in “Black Friday”. We even got Nancy to come along since she has never attended. We thought being down in a small town like Richfield, the crowds wouldn't be so bad. Boy, were we wrong. The line for Wal-Mart was the length of the parking lot and there were two lines. We decided to go for an $8 jacket and some entertainment. Instead we came out with a George Forman grill, a video camera, a portable DVD player, a toy for my nephew and a jacket. I don’t think we should go shopping on “Black Friday” for entertainment anymore.
I told Nancy that I wanted her to come up north next year and go shopping with me. She was the best part of shopping. She is true shopper and so I was surprised she had never gone. Mark stood back why Nancy and I immersed ourselves into the crowd of people grabbing cameras and DVD players. I trying to be polite was walking around the crowd trying to find the most polite way of entering the mob. Pretty soon I hear Nancy scream “Rosie”, as she pops here head up from the middle of the crowd. Then, I hear her say, “I got two”, as I look over I see Nancy holding up two portable DVD players.
As I make my way closer to Nancy to help her with the goods, she screams, “Do you want a video camera?” Before we knew it we had two DVD players and a camera and everyone was asking where we got them.
We then left Wal-Mart and headed over to K-mart. We had a blast and I can’t wait to take Nancy to some real crowds next year.
On Saturday, we carried on our new tradition and headed up to the mountains to cut down our Christmas tree. I was so excited to actually get to cut down our tree in the snow. There was about 2or 3 inches of snow where we were.
We invited Mark’s friend Kevin to come along and I’m sure he enjoyed walking all over the mountain with us as I critiqued every tree we came upon. We finally found a tree I was satisfied with and cut it down and brought it home. After we cut down our tree we took the 4-wheelers a little higher up the mountain to play in some more snow. Although it was cold we had a great deal of fun.

We finally got the tree decorated and the Christmas decorations up. With both of us working this year, I’m not as into the decorating and Christmas feel as I was last year. We have decorations up but that’s about it. I’m hoping to be a little more excited once Christmas break is here.
Merry Christmas!

Halloween 2008

This Halloween was nothing I would have ever expected.
I have been sick on and off for two whole weeks. I thought I was on the healing route this past week, but boy, was I wrong.

I went in to the doctors office for a cold I had for a week and it just wasn't getting any better. He gave me an antibiotic and it helped a lot. but the minute I was done taking the dosage, all of my symptoms were back. I tried to just take it easy but on Wednesday the following week I felt like I had the flu. I called a sub and went to the doctor where he gave a stronger antibiotic. It was called Factive. I started to take it and I was feeling a little bit better. Last Tuesday I took my last pill. I wouldn't say I felt like a million bucks but I was feeling better then usual.
That night I had to go to my new teacher cohort meeting in Pleasant Grove and then I had to hurry back and for my visiting teachers to stop by. As I was leaving the Elementary school I noticed my legs were a little itchy. I lifted my pant leg and noticed a few red bumps. I didn't think much of it and carried on with my schedule. Later that evening after the visiting teachers left I went into the back room to talk to Mark. The whole time I was just scratching away at my leg. Mark called my attention to it and I lifted up my pant legs and my legs had more red bumps. I pulled up my shirt sleeves and my arms had a few red bumps too. This was when I began to think that I had hives. I called mom to ask if it was common to get hives after taking the full dosage of medicine. She said that it can happen but its not as common. I decided to take some Benadryl and go to bed. I knew I would be okay in the morning.

When Mark woke me up the next morning I was a little surprised to find I was covered from head to toe with red bumps. I quickly got ready for work and headed to the school. I was supposed to go to a new teacher math conference that morning so I had arranged for a half day sub already. I decided I would just extend my lesson plan for a whole day and call my sub and just make arrangements for her to stay the whole day. I didn't even think twice that maybe my sub could not sub the entire day for me. Thanks goodness my fellow first grade team members helped me find a sub for the second half. I headed home to rest and take a heaping dosage of Benadryl.

I slept the day away and it seamed that the hives were just getting worse. By that evening Mark came home and was preparing to go to Young Mens. I decide to get up and walk around for a minute. The minute I got up I became faint and I blacked out. Luckily Mark was there to catch me. Mark helped me to the bed so I could lay down and relax. We decide right then I needed to get to a hospital. Mark called for our Home teacher to come help give me a blessing. Mom and Dad came over to help get me in the car and get me dressed to go outside.

Mark took me over the the Orem Community Hospital at 6:45, and just our luck they were busy. We got registered at the desk and then we had to wait for the 3 people in front of us. When they finally called my name they whisked off into a room and started to check my vitals. My blood pressure was very low, I had a temperature of 102.8 and I was dehydrated. They hooked me up to an IV and then I waited. They ran some more test on me and found that my white blood count was very high. Mark was a little upset with the doctor that came in and told us that from what he could see I had an allergic reaction to something and that was why I was covered with a rash, and I had some kind of infection for my white blood count to be so high. We kinda already knew all that. So he wrote me a prescription for something to help with the itching and told me to stay home for the rest of the week unless i started to feel better. Needless to say the ER doctor was very helpful. We finally left the hospital at 11:30pm.

We went home where I slept for a few hours but was up with uncontrollable itching and coughing. I went into the bathroom to find my face swollen. I couldn't get back to sleep after that, and I was keeping Mark up. I stayed up for the rest of the evening on the couch watching Ocean's 12. When Mark's alarm went off for him to go to work, I called mom to see if she could come over and get me so I could get my prescription filled and to stay with me because with the swelling in my face, the doctor was worried that my throat might swell up and cut off my air supply. Mom came and got me and found me looking like this.

I was just lucky enough, once again to have my team help me find a substitute and prepare my classroom with sub plans.

I ended up at the doctor later that day where they ran more tests on me. They decided to give my body some time to rest and they wanted to see me again in the morning.

The next day was Halloween. I was going to have to miss my very first Halloween as a teacher. I didn't have to worry about finding a sub thank goodness because my team had already arranged one. As much as I wanted to go I knew I couldn't go looking like this. This is what my body looked like as of Friday evening.

This is my leg.






















My back.



My arm.













Thank goodness the swelling in my face finally went down too.

So I guess the moral of this story is... I won't be taking Factive anytime soon.
I'm so sad that i missed my first Halloween. On a funnier note I did have mom take me up to the school so I could see all the kids dressed up. I was able to walk in my room and it in the back and watch my kids for 15 minutes with out any of them noticing me. I also was able to poke my head into my mentor teacher's classroom and say hello and she had to ask who I was.
As of today my arms and face are starting to look like normal and the red spots that cover the rest of my body are starting to look lighter. I am going to attempt teaching school tomorrow in slippers.

One down one more to go!

I just finished my first ever, parent teacher conference tonight and I have one more to do tomorrow. I know a lot of you have wondered what in the world has happened to me. I'm not dead I'm just busy. Now that I have finished up with one parent teacher conference I'm hoping things will run a little smoother. Well, as smooth as a first ear can go.
I do have one more obstacle this month. I have my first principal observation and then maybe I'll feel better.
I am enjoying teaching most days. I get tired really easy and of course some days I want to give up, but thank goodness for, Mark that won't let me and my family that push me a long and help me in so many ways.

I do have some things to post about, like the brand new king size bed Mark and I bought that I love so very much. Also, Mark and I are planning on going out this weekend to finally try out the 4 wheeler we received from Mark's parents a while ago. I also have fall break next week so I can get some posts up with pictures.

I get bored easily!

Mark was gone for a few hours on Saturday and I decided I had, had enough of the ponytail. These are the reults!

Dog the Bounty Hunter

To all of you that know me and know that I actually watch Dog and enjoy watching Dog you are going to love my adventures today in First Grade.

Today in my afternoon class I was working with the whole class on a graphing assignment where we looking for who had the longest name and the shortest name in the class. I did it like a guessing game. I randomly pulled kids name out of a jar and the kids would write the letters to the mystery students name in the boxes on there paper. Don't worry, this is just background knowledge all you really need to know is, I was spelling students names and allowing the kids to guess who's name I was spelling. After I gave one letter they all started guessing.

I came to on child who's name started with a "D". I said, "First letter is a "d", I heard some logical guesses, then I heard one that caught me off guard. One little boy who sits right next to where I was working said, "D" Dog. I didn't really think to much of it because he is known to say random things before. Then I gave the next letter, "E" I over heard him again, "Its got to be dog." Now your thinking this is kinda funny because dog is spelled with an "o" not a "e". Well, when I gave the next letter it was all I could do to keep myself from laughing out loud. I said to the class, "the next letter is "r". I then heard the little boy say, "r?" "Darn it can't be dog." Then he says to himself, "that's okay because Dog the Bounty Hunter isn't in our class any way."

I just wanted to laugh out loud after that. I'm so glad I had on my good listening ears so I could catch his little conversation with himself. I'm also glad Dog the Bounty Hunter is not a student in my class.

On a side note, I had my first student burst into tears today, and I thought I had a pink eye outbreak. I had a student come to school after being diagnosed with pink eye yesterday. Then today I had another girl with all the same symptoms. I sent her off to the nurse, and disinfected my desks right away. Come to find out later, when I was reading my students information sheets, I read on the little girls sheet who I thought had pink eye, that she has sever allergies and gets read puffy watery eyes that sometimes can be mistaken for pink eye. OOPS!

I survived!!!!

I just survived my very first day of teaching! It is 9:00pm and I just got home for the day but I survived. I even had a little fun. None of my first day of school nightmares came true I feel like I had the class under control and no one was called in to supervise or assist. I think that counts for something.
I did have some interesting things happen, I had a student pee her pants and we had to call her mom. I had my class fish die over the weekend and no one noticed it including me until after lunch. I was hoping no one would think to look at the fish since no one in the morning even mentioned it but without fail one student had to come over right before class ended and say to me rather loudly, "Hey, what happened to the red fish?" This then caused a ripple effect and soon I had the whole class chiming in where's the fish or what fish?, or I can't find the fish? If anyone says anything tomorrow I'll just say I decided to take the fish home!
Wish me luck as now I have to be back tomorrow at 7:30 am to do it all over again!

It's finally done!

This post is dedicated to my wonderful family!
Thank you for all you have done to help me get where I am today. All the time and effort you have given me through the years and the past few months. Thank you for supporting me from the very beginning. Thanks to all those that stayed up with me and let me cry on their shoulders that encouraged me when I wanted to give up. Believed in me no matter what!

Thank you Mark, for putting up with me, late at night when I was freaking out over something that seemed really big at the time, but really was small in the end. Thank you for letting me spend a little extra money to make my room feel more complete. For putting up with late night take out or lack of sleep so I could get one more thing complete. Thank you for your prayer and blessings to helped me get through school and life. Thank you for just being there!

Thank you Mom, for putting up with me from the very beginning of things. Thanks for putting up with my melt downs and still encouraging me to keep going. You never gave up on me. Thank you for the hours of cutting and coloring and other time and effort you put into projects to make me stand out and helped me go above and beyond. Thank you for still helping me when I get frustrated and take it out on you even though you didn't deserve it. Thank you for your creativity and pushiness. Those little things you pushed me to do really did make all the difference. Thank you for all the hours you have spent and the money you have spent. And also even though I said I didn't want it, thank you for the fish in my room.

Thank you Dad, for supporting me and encouraging to keep going in your own special way. Thank you for, letting mom be gone all the time to help me. Thank you for not shooting her when she bought another thing for me and my classroom. Thank you for coming after work to help mark the cupboards in my room it really made a difference. Thanks for coming and examining the globe in my room or providing comic relief when we have been working in my room. Thank you for all you have done.

Thank you Amanda, for your willingness to help out. Thank you for all the hours and hours you have put into making posters, and post cards, and writing my class list 500 times on 50 different things. Thank you for dragging your boys to my classroom to help me put up bulletin boards. Thank you for all of your encouraging remarks and telling me how proud you are of me. Thank you for letting me call you or text you all the time just so I can ask you what you think about putting a certain sign in my room. Thank you for always being the big sister that wasn't afraid to be honest with me. Thank you for everything you have done for me.

Thank you Cameron, for letting me steal your wife time and time again. Thank you for taking the boys all day on a Saturday so Amanda could spend more time helping me.

Thank you Tait, Blake and Miles, for enduring hours and hours of time in a small classroom watching movies on a little TV while your mom and I set up my room. Thank you Tait and Blake for sharpening all the pencils in my classroom. Thank you for trying your very hardest to be extra good while we completed just one more thing, in hopes that Aunt Rosie would keep her word and take you out to the playground. I owe you a few hours on the playground. Thanks for hanging in there.

Thank you Mike and Becky, for being willing to help out in any way. To come up to help me organize books even if it fell through. Thank you for your willingness Becky to cut out hundred of word wheels while we camped. Thank you for always being interested in what I was doing and how the classroom was coming. Thanks for just being willing to talk about school.

Thank you to my grandparents, for supporting me through the years and always being there to encourage me. Thank you Grandma Winnie for always asking how the classroom is going and telling me what a wonderful teacher I will be and how proud you are of me. Thank you for giving me a love of reading and all the books you have given me over the years. Thank you!

Thank you to all the other people that have helped and supported me along the way.

I am so very lucky my Heavenly Father blessed me with such a kind, loving and supportive family. I wouldn't be who I am today if I didn't have them! I hope that by me reaching my goal to become a teacher I help a few others feel like they too have reached a goal. I hope I can help and encourage anyone else to reach for the stars and make their dreams a reality.

This slide show is for all those that helped me reach my dream!

One Year!

Last weekend Mark and I celebrated our one year anniversary!

I can't believe a whole year has gone by already. It feels like it's only been a few months. This past year has been the best year. I am ready and excited for many more years to come together.

Our anniversary fell on a Sunday this year so we had to improvise a little bit. To start off I had to give Mark his present a few days early. I wanted to get him some tools for his new job he started about a month ago. I had it all planned. I had talked to Cameron to see where to go to get some good start up tools and was waiting to go get them.

That all changed when Mark came home and informed me that we needed to go get him some tools. I tried to convince him to wait but when Mark gets an idea in his head it can be hard to change his mind. So I gave in and told him what my present was going to be. So we decided that we would go together to pick out his gift.

Mark had way to much fun picking out all his toys. Since I didn't get a picture of him opening his gift, I took pictures of him picking out his gift.

He told me the next day that his tools really did come in handy.

When we left the store that night after picking out his tools, Mark asked me if I wanted my gift early since he received his early. I told him, no, I would wait.

I decided I would plan our anniversary this year since Mark had been in the past working Saturdays. I told Mark a few weeks ago I would take care of it. Then he told me a week later he wouldn't be working that Saturday. (I should have made him take over!)

I planned to go up to Cascade Springs that day and have lunch. Well when he didn't have to work that Saturday things got a little mixed up.

Mom and Dad decided to go camping on the spur of the moment. We went down to help Dad load up the generator into the truck. They invited us to come a long if we wanted to. Mark surprised me when he said that he would like to go even if it was just for the night. I agreed we could go as long as we left in time to come down and go to dinner and maybe a movie.

So we loaded up some sleeping gear and headed for the mountains. On the way up Mark decided he would give me my Anniversary gift. I was very impressed Mark wrapped it himself in a lovely tan Fossil bag. Mark gave me a very nice red (does he know me or what?) faced watch . I told him a while ago I would like a watch for when school started. He did an amazing job picking out a very nice watch.


After chilling out in the mountains we came back home to celebrate. We cleaned up and went to Goodwood Barbecue for dinner. As always it was delicious. Then we went to a movie theater to catch a movie but any movies that looked good to us were either sold out or we were to late for the showing. So we decided we would stop off at Smiths pick up some ice cream and then go rent a movie. We rented Batman Begins. We thought I had better see it, since I had seen the second movie but never the first.


For the record: I may just be a wimp but I thought Batman Begins was more intense and a lot more scary then Dark Night. That scarecrow freaked me out!


We had a very relaxing low key anniversary but I enjoyed every minute of it. We both needed relaxing and low key with our schedules. Who knows what next year will bring.

24th of July Weekend

Our 24th of July wasn't what I was expecting. We did nothing like we usually do. Mark had to work so I went over to Amanda's to hang out for the day. We got more things ready for my classroom. This time we created my welcome postcards I am going to send out to my students. Amanda did, once again, an amazing job!

While we waited for them to print we decided we deserved a tasty treat for all our hard work. So we headed over to Rumbi Island Grill for our favorite, Aloha Chicken salad, it seriously is to die for! MMMMM! MMMM!

Later that night after Mark got off work we loaded up the truck and headed down south to spend the weekend with Mark's family. We got there just in time to say hello to everybody set up our air mattress and head off to bed.

While we are down there Mark and I get spoiled. We always have a hot breakfast when we go down there, with all the trimmings. Mark's dad knows how to make the most perfect looking pancakes I have ever seen. They are always golden brown and all the same size. I love it!

While we were down there Mark changed the coil packs in our truck (Don't ask me what they are or how they work! All I know is our truck runs 100 times better then it did before.). We also got to go into the big city with Nancy and go shopping. (I love it, that even Nancy calls Richfield the big city.) Later that night I experienced something I have never seen before. I went to the Salina City Burn Off.

What's they Salina City Burn Off you ask, well its where people get to make a lot of smoke with their tires. Guys bring their trucks and cars to see how much smoke they can make their tires put out in a certain amount of time. It was actually pretty fun. It was fun to watch which ones could make a lot of smoke and also to watch one kid who couldn't make any smoke but kept trying. One of the cars put something on his tires so when he smoked them it put off red and blue smoke. I wish I would have got a picture of that. Although I still don't understand the point of this tradition. Mark promises me that its more fun to actually do the burning of the tires. I think I'll take his word for it.

Then after the Burn Off Chase and Nancy invited us to go with them to see the new Batman movie. It was sooooo good. I have never seen any of the other Batman movies so I didn't know what to expect. I had also hear d that it was a dark movie. I wasn't to sure about going to see it. I loved it though. It was very action packed that was for sure. Heath Ledger did an amazing job as The Joker. I was very impressed.

The next day we slept in until 11:30. After we got dressed and ready for the day we went back over to Salina to go to the Blast from the Past car show. There were a lot of really neat cars there. Its amazing to see what people have hidden away in their garages.

The show had a very special treat too. They had Dale Earnhadrt Jr.'s car. So we had to take a picture for all our NASCAR loving fans.

As you can see Mark was super excited to see the race car!

During this trip Mark inherited a 4-wheeler from his dad. His dad divided up the 4-wheelers and gave one to all of his kids. We are very excited for the 4-wheeler, and we are very thankful to be given one. We can't wait for next years annual 4-wheeling trip! We will be there for sure!

The weekend wasn't what I had expected. We didn't have any picnics in the park, at someones house or in the canyon. We didn't even have Grandma's Birthday cake. But overall we had a good time!

Bread for Birth Control

Yes you read it right I bake bread for cheaper birth control!
I started this little agreement with my pharmacist about a year ago, right after Mark and I got married. You see my pharmacist is a family friend and when I was younger I would make him bread for some extra spending cash. When I got older I quit making him bread. So every time I went into the pharmacy he would hint around about how good a warm loaf of bread would be.
Right after Mark and I were married we didn't have insurance because Mark started a job the week before. My Birth control pills were super expensive. I went in to pick them up with my mom one day and she told me to see if I could work a deal with Brent to get him to make my pills cheaper. So that is when it started. I bake him two loafs of bread in exchange for a discount on my birth control. I did this for a few months until we got our insurance.
Well, since Mark has changed jobs I'm back in that same boat. I will be receiving insurance through the school but that won't start until the first of September. So I'm back to baking bread. Thank goodness Brent is so willing to work a deal with me just so I can save quite a few bucks!
I can't wait for the day that I can tell my grandchildren that I baked bread for birth control.

School Fever

I decided I better post some pictures of my classroom. I have just recently caught the school bug. Now, don't get me wrong I'm still scared out of my mind and am having the first day of school nightmares but I'm enjoying the getting ready and I just want to jump into it.
I have spent a few days here and there getting ready. Starting next week I will be there full time. I will have my last day of work at Seagull book on Friday and then I plan to spend as much time as possible in my classroom.
Amanda and mom have helped me so much with getting the room ready. They have been such a big help! I can't thank them enough.
Her are some pictures of what it looks like.

This is how the room kind looked when I first got my keys. The only difference was all the supplies were in the back corner. I spent a day up there separating things into different piles.



To those of you who teaching in newer schools, check out my orange walls and golden yellow cupboards! Aren't they nifty? I do enjoy the fact that two of my walls are metal so I use magnets to put up all the posters on my walls.

Mom came up to the school and helped me put some things away and start working on putting things up on the walls. Here's how that looked.

We laminated all my bulletin boards that day. We cut out a lot of lamination that day!
Amanda and her boys came over a few weeks ago and spent the whole day with me putting up bulletin boards and helping with other projects. I sadly did not take any pictures.
Then last Saturday Mom and Amanda spent the whole day with me setting up the classroom. We put the desks out and more bulletin boards. We started setting up the class library area and made the room actually look like a classroom not a storage area. Again, I sadly did not take any pictures but I will the next time I am up and then I will post them for you. Its getting closer and the closer it get the more excited I become!

How Many of Me?

I saw this on a friends blog and I had to try it out and post my results. So how many of you are there?

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 65 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Silly Boys

On Sunday Mark and I went over to Amanda's to watch a movie and hang out. Tait asked Uncle Mark if he would go downstairs and see his race track. Mark told him yes and Mark, Cameron and the little boys headed downstairs to check out the shake and roll race track. Amanda and I remined upstairs for a little while longer before we joined them.
We were a little surprised to find this happening down stairs. Notice the little boys are no where in sight.




Click on the picture to watch the movie.

Tagged!!

1. What were you doing 10 years ago?
I was thirteen years old and probably hanging out at home and enjoying my summer!

2. Five things on your to do list today?
Complain about being sore
Pick up Grandma’s prescriptions
Return my library book so I don’t get another fine.
Cut out letter wheels.
Put something up on the blog so I don’t get a nasty text message at 8 in the morning from a certain sister.

3. Snacks I enjoy:
Everything! Chocolate, Ice-cream, brownies, Oh’ Henries, Cookies, anything with peanut butter,

4. What would I do if suddenly I were a billionaire?
I would pay off the cars and my school loans and buy a new house and Mark a better truck with a natural gas kit in it.

5. 3 bad habits:
Worrying
Chewing my finger nails
Putting things off for another day

6. Five places I've lived:-
Orem
American Fork
Heber
That’s it!

7. Five jobs I've had:
Preschool aid/ teacher
Provo Craft warehouse worker
Seagull book
Magazine distributor
Substitute teacher

8. Five things people don't know about me:
I broke my arm playing kissing tag in fifth grade and told my mom that I just tripped over my friend’s foot so my friend wouldn’t get in trouble.
I have a great moose call and I always seem to do it at the most embarrassing times.
I secretly love old western music, the kind my dad listens to but I wont admit that.
I have had plastic surgery
I hate being tagged because of questions like this one!


I tag: Amanda, Erica, Heather, Lindsey, and who ever else!

Look what we have been up to!

I decided I had better get on here and blog before I get too far behind. A lot has happened in the past few weeks here at the Curtis’. We have been very busy!


On May 27 Mark and I had to say good bye to our very good friends the Mack’s. They left to make the long trek back home to Ohio to begin a new chapter in their lives.

As you can see both Mark and I are very sad to see them go, but we are excited for them as they begin this new adventure much closer to family. We just hope to make many trips out to Ohio to visit often. Thank goodness for blogs to keep us up to date!

Mark and I have been looking for natural gas vehicles off and on for a little while, but when the house deal fell through we decided to take it a little more serious. We spent days and nights scouring the internet for a good deal on a natural gas truck. After quite a search we found one. I was on KSL cars just moments after someone posted a 2000 Ford F-150 pickup. I called Mark immediately and told him what I found. We called the guy right away and set up a time to meet to check the truck out. We were a little disappointed to find out how beat up the truck was. Mark decided he could fix it up, so he negotiated with the man to sell it for a thousand dollars less. We are now the proud owners of a 2000 Ford Natural Gas Truck. Mark has received quite a bit of criticism and teasing for buying a Ford, but he just tells everyone he will be the one laughing when he is paying 64 cents a gallon to fill the truck up rather than $4.00 a gallon.

That brings me to my next bit of news. We are selling my Cavalier to get rid of an extra car and an extra car payment. If you know of anyone looking for a great little car that is excellent for gas millage let us know. It’s a 2004 Chevy Cavalier, it has super low miles (37K) and it’s in great condition.




We are also selling Mark’s truck if anyone is looking for a Dodge D-50 Convertible! This was Mark’s show truck that he built in High school. It has all the added little extras like shaved handles and a suicide hood. It can also be a low rider truck if that’s your cup of tea.


My Birthday was last Friday and I guess you could say I am one year older and wiser too! My sisters boys made my day when they called and left a message on my phone whishing me a happy 13th birthday! When Amanda asked them how old they thought I was, Tait guessed 13! Man Mark married young.

Last year for my Birthday we went bowling with some friends from the singles ward a day or two before my birthday. We ended up celebrating my birthday and another friend from the wards (Blake) birthday. I was excited to find out we were doing it again this year. Here are some pictures from the event last year and this year! I don’t have too many from this year since my camera batteries were dying.
Last year:

















This Year




On my actual Birthday Mark surprised me by giving me a picture of Christ. All day Mark kept hounding me to go pick up my paycheck from work. I continued o tell him that I would either today or tomorrow because it wasn’t a big deal since I was only picking up the paycheck stub my check had already been direct deposited. He kept insisting I go. So after lunch I decided I would go down and get it and then go get my hair cut. When I got to work Jared came to the back to give me my schedule and to give me something Mark wanted me to have. Mark had bought the Simon Dewey picture, “The Lord is my Sheppard” .
the night before and instead of trying to hide it from me just kept it at work. I was so surprised! This is one of my favorite pictures.
Later that day I treated myself to a haircut for my birthday. Then when Mark got off work we went out to dinner at Macaroni Grill. It was a wonderful day! Mark did a good job on the surprise too! I definitely have the WORLD’S GREATEST HUSBAND!
Then to end the week Mark and I were able to attend my friend Gina’s wedding up at the Salt Lake Temple. It was a beautiful wedding.

It has been a busy few weeks but we have enjoyed every minute of it.

Chirp Chirp!

It all started on Saturday when we weren't getting any hot water in the shower. I hoped in the shower on Saturday morning to find that there was only cold water. Now I used to have this problem of cold showers growing up in a family of five and if I was the last to shower on a particular day then I was doomed to have a cold shower, but when there are just two people in a house with two water heaters you tend to be a little surprised when this happens to you. After some screaming in the shower on my end Mark headed outside to look in our air vents. Sure enough there was a bird’s nest tucked away in the hole. Mark got a couple of hanger and stretched them out to get the nest out. Not only was he able to get the nest out but he also knocked out two baby birds. Problem solved right? Wrong!

On Monday night we noticed some chirping near the air conditioner. We didn't think much of the chirping because they uncovered our air conditioner on Saturday so we just thought that because of this we could just hear the birds chirping outside better. The only problem was the chirping didn't go away. We turned on the air conditioner and they still chirped. As we investigated the chirping a little more we realized the noise became louder when we opened the washroom doors. We soon discovered that the Birds had crawled into the dryer vent from outside and made their way to the middle of our house and nested the dryer vent.

We called our land lady to see who we need to call to have this taken care of. We weren't sure if this was the responsibility of her or are HOA. She gave me an e-mail address of the management guy and told me to keep her in touch. I didn't like that answer so I called the HOA president, and he told me that because they were in our house they were our problem. We got out our hook again and pulled out some more nest and feathers. The chirping soon stopped so we figured the birds had flown away. We borrowed a shop vac from our neighbor Kory to see if we could vacuum up the last of their remains and maybe a bird if it was still in there. We also blocked off the vent so they wouldn't return.

That night I didn't sleep very well and I tossed and turned. I began to hear a weird noise outside and I woke Mark up at about 7 am to see if he knew what it was. He heard the noise too so he go up to open our bedroom do just to hear the sound of chirping birds in the ceiling again! The weird noise I heard was the parents trying to get into the vent again to get to their babies. They were hitting the side of the house. So at 7 o'clock in the morning this was Marks plan of attack!
(Click ont he film strip to watch the movie)











After about an hour we saw a bird jump out of the hole outside. We no longer heard chirping so we sealed the hole up again and we went to work. When I got home again around 2 I heard chirping the minute I walked into the door. I called Mark immediately. He already knew and had put a piece of bread at the end of the pipe that was in our washroom to try a lure him out. So I sat in our house this afternoon reading a book and listening to a bird chirp. Needles to say, by the time Mark got home I was ready to scream. I wanted the stupid bird out. We could hear it inch its way closer to the food but it just wasn’t brave enough to go for it. So we decided to try a new plan of attack. After two more holes in the ceiling we were finally able to corner him.

I truly enjoyed walking into the back room to find my husband’s head in the ceiling.

He was able to take a picture of our new friend. After about another hour and one more hole in our ceiling the bird was out. The chirping has stopped and I am very grateful. But now, I have four holes in my ceiling. I would be upset but Mark assured me he could fix them. In the mean time I have vowed to never own a bird as a pet for the rest of my life.