It's November!

Wow, time has really flown! This semester is moving in hyper-speed and we're doing all we can just to stay afloat! But it's encouraging to know we're so close. Graduation is in 40 days :) Woo-hoo!
Also worth celebrating: I have been accepted into the grad program in the ASU Teacher's College. I will start school again in January working on my 14 month MA in Elementary Ed :) I'm so excited! I love journalism and I'm glad that I was able to choose it for my first degree. But the farther I've gotten into it, the more I've realized it's very incompatible with having a family and just isn't what I love the most. This oppportunity to get my MA and AZ Teaching Certification has been such a blessing! I can't wait to get started!
I've been meaning to blog for over a week, so here are the somewhat outdated Halloween pictures :) We had some friends from our ward over to carve pumpkins. So spooky! (Austin the Artist did the Ghostbusters. Doesn't it look great?!)


And we dressed up as Lois Lane and Clark Kent. Superman is Austin's favorite superhero and it's always been our joke that I'm obviously Lois (journalist and all). Fun stuff!

I love my Bosch!

Today Austin had to work (even though it's a Saturday) so I was home alone for most of my Saturday. I put on a Michael Buble cd and tackled a long list of projects that have been building up for a few weeks. One of those was to bake rolls, yep, with my mom's famous recipe.

One of the secrets to her amazing rolls is using a Bosch to mix and kneed the dough. My grandparents and aunts and uncles chipped in to get me a Bosch for the wedding and I can't even say how grateful I am! I love having this machine, it makes such a difference! I've used it to make cookies several times, but this was my first attempt at bread on my own machine.

They are pretty good if I do say so myself!

Me and bread haven't always worked out. My siblings love to tell the stories of times I've set garlic toast on fire or blackened the rolls that were supposed to be for dinner... Needless to say, baking rolls that not only taste good but didn't catch fire is a BIG DEAL for me :)

Thank heavens for midterms!

I know, I sound crazy. Can you believe I just gave thanks for midterm exams? Well, in case you hadn't noticed, I've been pretty absent from the blogging world. Here is the #1 reason why:
And this isn't even the complete stack of all the books I have to read this semester. Literature classes are fun and I'm really enjoying them, but taking 4 at one time means a full schedule! Don't get me wrong, I love to read :) and I'd much rather have reading homework than math problems, but it gets pretty time consuming! However, this week I have 3 midterms, so I don't have to read a Restoration English drama, a Shakespearian play or a book that was later made into a movie. Just have to read King Arthur legends :)

Married life is treating us quite well! :) We are definitely busy, and don't see each other as much as we'd like, but we are grateful to both have jobs (and cars!) and be able to make ends meet.

Since it's been so long since I've blogged, I thought I'd put in a photo collage of how we've been staying busy and having fun as a new married couple :)

First, meet our cute, little apartment:

Here's a few shots from the Switchfoot/Goo Goo Dolls concert we went to about a month ago. It was both mine and Austin's first concert and we really liked it! (It helps that those are our two favorite bands)

And here's a couple pictures from our Honeymoon in San Diego, CA. We also went to Disneyland, but most of our pictures are all on Austin's camera, which I of course don't have with me right now. I'll try to get those up sometime soon.

Happy Newlyweds

It was been quite a while since I last posted, because life has been crazy! The weeks before the wedding were busy busy! The day of was wonderful :) and life slowed down for about a week after that. But we're back to running non stop, now that school has started again.
Austin leaves for class at 6:30 every morning and then goes strait to work until 5:30. I leave a 7 twice a week for class and then go to work until 6:30. Other days, I go downtown for class, back to Chandler for work, then back downtown for another class and don't get home until 9. :( It's hard to be apart so much. We see each other for a half hour in the morning and then a couple hours at night. We honestly live for the weekends! But married life in wonderful and we are so grateful for the time we do get to spend together!
We got all of our wedding pictures back this week. It's been so fun to look through all of them :)
Here are some of my favorites...

Last day and 2 weeks away!

Today is the last day of a 10 week internship I've held this summer. It has been quite an experience. This is my sixth internship, but the first time that I've ever worked full time in the journalism world. Normally I work 2 or 3 days and spend most afternoons with Kids Express. It's not been what I expected. It's not difficult, but it's not what I thought it would be. And more than that, I've found that I really miss seeing my kids every day. I love being in the classroom and I feel a lot more comfortable there than in the newsroom. Who knows where I'll end up, but I'm considering getting my Master's in Education so I can teach instead. Only time will tell...
The other big news (well it's much bigger really): Our wedding is only 14 days away!
It hardly feels real; we've been waiting for this to come for so long that it seems like a mean joke and we'll be forced to wait another four months. But it's actually here!
So many exciting things are happening: next week we take our pictures, I'm getting my dress tailored (I sure haven't worn that thing enough and I'm eager to put it back on!), we're signing the lease on our apartment, family is coming into town... Gosh we just can't wait!

Cute doggies

Tonight, Austin and I were shopping for bedding at Ross (we scored btw) when Austin thought to go check for a small bed for one of his dogs.

The Baxters have 2 dogs, a Yorkie named Sailor and a King Charles Spaniel named Story (she's still a puppy ).

Sailor, on the other hand, is getting up there in years and has bad arthritis. She's also much heavier than a Yorkie should be. Most Yorkies weigh in at 8 pounds. Sailor weighs 21.

Like any girl should, Sailor loves to be cozy and normally cuddles up in a corner to sleep.

But look at her now...

Story was very curious

Here are both the girls

Wedding update: 25 days left :)

Less than a month!

As of today, there are 28 days left until the wedding! We are, obviously, so excited.

Life is just moving along. I only have two weeks left of my internship and then I get two weeks off before the wedding! Thank goodness

I'm living back at home right now. I have a month in limbo between one lease ending and our new one beginning. I could have stayed at the place in Tempe, which would have been great to be close to work, Austin and my great roommates, but dealing with the landlord has been such a nightmare. I was happy to leave all the drama that came with her. If you hear of someone moving into a house owned by Kathryn Jones, tell them to run FAR AWAY. I promise it will save you so much headache.

But life is good. I am sharing a room with Janie for the last time, and taking up all the space that she has gotten used to in the past 7 months! And she lets me steal clothes from her closet. I have a pretty sweet gig :)

Also, Austin has finally realized that reading is a good thing and bookstores are not all bad :) I can't tell you how excited it makes me! My family has gotten really excited with the release of the last Harry Potter movie trailer and Harry Potter fever has spread to Austin. He's actually reading the books!

We went to my 2 favorite stores, Bookmans and Half-Price Books, last night and believe it or not, Austin bought more books than I did! I am blown away and quite pleasantly surprised :) I'll make a bibliophile out of him yet!

Last night I also found the funniest gift card at Half-Price. Please tell me someone else gets it... Austin sort of chuckled and my parents didn't get it. Oh well, somebody must

All things green

so this week, the Reynolds Center for Businenss Journalism is hosting a "covering the green economy" seminar. as a lucky intern, I will be covering most of the classes and events.

It should be interesting. I'm not opposed to being green, in fact I think to some extent it's very wise, saving energy=saving money, and I use re-usable grocery bags and water bottles and all that jazz. But I'm not buying into everything... we'll see how this week goes.

Threes

They say good things come in threes. Well, whoever "they" are, I think they're right!

First, I found out on Monday that the Goo Goo Dolls (my favorite band) are coming to Phoenix in August! I have missed them the past 3 times that they were here. But I bought tickets on Wednesday and Austin and I are going! I'm way excited. (just maybe not to see the funky hair)

Second, we have an apartment! We found out yesterday that we were accepted. It's a little place, one bed one bath, in a complex called Rancho Murrieta in Tempe. (Rural and Broadway) But it has a lot of closet space, a decent sized kitchen and an in-unit washer and dryer. It even has a little patio :)

I am not the greatest at using photobooth but here is a backwards shot of our apartment. It's cozy, but best of all it's OURS!!!

And third, the best news of all... Today is 7 weeks until the wedding! 49 days! We have been counting down and it feels soo good to get under 50 :) I can't wait!

Officially a slacker

Admittedly, blogging has not been high on my priority list since I started this new job.

I am interning full time 3 days a week at the Phoenix Business Journal and 2 days a week at the Reynolds Center for Business Journalism, a national center housed at ASU's downtown Cronkite school.

My time has been rationed in a completely different way. I'm doing the 9 to 5 thing everyday, but it turns into the 8 to 6 thing with travel time. But, although it's not quite what I thought it would be, it's not bad. I'm getting a lot out of it and I'm building good contacts who will hopefully help me get a job in a year.

On the wedding planning front, things are going well! We are working on collecting all our addresses right now. And I'm designing the invitation. It's almost finished.

Taking the pictures for the announcement was tons of fun! Here are some of my favorite shots:

Calling all Potter Heads

I'm a proud Harry Potter fan. I've read all the books and really like them. Seen the movies, most of them at midnight opening day.

But, I thought this was a little much....

So school is nearly done for the summer! I have two more finals next Monday and Tuesday.

Outside of work and school, Austin and I went to two of his brother Cole's concerts this week. Cole is a pretty amazing musician. He sings in the top choirs at Marcos de Niza; they actually got an invite to perform in Carnegie Hall this year!

Tuesday's concert was the most advanced choir. It was great; very talented people! Thursday's was the "pops" concert (popular music) and three different choirs performed songs from that show GLEE and Michael Jackson. Pretty entertaining :)

And tonight we are going to First Fridays and I am so excited! I haven't been in months.

What an art filled week!

It's the final countdown

That's right folks. Spring 2010 semester is over in three school days! Next week I have my last 2 days of classes and then a couple of scattered finals. I cannot wait!

Me, mom and Janie have been doing some wedding planning in between all the homework and jobs we have. Mom is swamped with girls camp and Mormon Prom coming up quick, and I have school and work all week, but Friday mornings have become our planning times. As of today, we officially have 101 days left 'til the wedding! :)

It's been way exciting! I never really thought I'd get into this kind of thing, but it's fun picking colors and finding centerpieces and stuff. And I really love looking at wedding dresses online :)

This Friday and next Friday we are going to try some on.

Well, my blog has been stagnant and unchanging, but my life sure hasn't!

Dum dum da dum :)

Well, it's official! (as you all know by now) But Austin and I are engaged!! It has been completely wonderful and I am so excited :) Sorry for the week long delay but here is our story...
Last Friday, Austin and I both took a day off work and went up north, with the intent to hike near Show Low, have a picnic lunch and just get away. I have to admit, when Austin asked me to go I had a pretty good suspicision that this was why. But the day before we left, plans kept changing. We looked online and found that the forest we wanted to head to was closed seasonally and woudn't reopen til May.
So we modified a little and headed up early Friday morning for the Rim area. But alas, when we made it up to the turn off for the Rim Road Lakes, it was barred and locked. So...we were kindof at a loss. I gave up hope that he would be asking, because all the plans got frustrated.
We spent the day in various places, four wheeling for a while,

having lunch at Kolh's Ranch,
visiting Chrisopher Creek, but ultimately ended up deciding to head to ShowLow anyways.
On our way there, we saw the turn off for Snowflake, AZ. Austin said he'd never been to the temple there so I said, Well then let's go!
We wanted to stay until it got dark to look at stars (we have both taken astronomy and agreed that stargazing for class in the city is not as fun) So we had several hours to kill.
We arrived at the Snowflake Tempe at 3:30 and walked around for a while. We sat down on a granite bench behind the temple, overlooking the back fence and the rest of the city.

Austin then told me we should play a game. He was going to draw something in the dirt and I would guess what it was. And vice versa. So he sent me down the steps and around the other side of the temple while he drew.
After a few minutes of waiting, he came and got me. I walked to the back fence where he had drawn and started at the ground for a bit. Suddenly I realized what he had written.
I caught my breath and turned around. He was sitting behind me on the step, holding the ring.
>
> It was beauiful and so perfect. The whole day had been. And I was so relieved that he actually did ask!! :) He even suceeded in surprising me

I want to be Jack Bauer!

Ok, so I'm not a big TV person. I love the show Veronica Mars, but since it was cancelled 2 years ago, I haven't had any shows I watched regularly. Usually the Office, but that depend on the week.

However, my tune has changed. I am officially hooked on the show 24! It is so good! For years I have heard people talk about it, but I'd never watched it.

Austin and his mom love 24. They have watched several seasons and have some on DVD. So right before the season started, they caught me up a little and we started off with a 4 hour marathon of 24 season 8 (the last season, of course, because I finally jumped on board)

If you've never seen the show before, it is about a man named Jack Bauer, who is pretty amazing. He specializes in counter-terrorism tactics and is just plain good at doing the right thing. It's very intense and fast-paced which I love. The show runs in real time, each hour long episode makes up one part of the 24 hour day (one whole season covers one day)

I'm definitely addicted. It's become our Monday night tradition to go over to Austin's after FHE to watch the new episode. This week, however, we were gone Monday and Tuesday and so we just caught up last night.

And wouldn't you know it, this week's episode was a 2 hour special! IT WAS FANTASTIC!

I know I'm a total dork, but I was glued. It was so exciting!

I can't wait til next Monday! :) Must have 24!

Random Dancing!

Have you seen the Nick show iCarly? It's a silly show (although I have to admit I find it hilarious) about a girl named Carly who runs a web show with her 2 best friends. They have this segment on their show called "Random Dancing" where crazy music plays and everyone has to, obviously, dance.

Yesterday at work I decided to try it :) It was sooo cute! My kids love to dance, we do it alot, but yesterday was even better. I have made multiple CDs of kid friendly, yet popular and upbeat songs to use, but yesterday our boom box busted.

So I jumped on the computer in my classroom and used the projector speakers instead. I was looking for music online, but I had to avoid district firewalls so I ended up on this obscure but awesome website called televisiontunes.com. If you are looking for any TV theme song (and I mean ANY, recent or past) they will have it! It was a blast :)

Looks like we will be doing a lot more Random Dancing in the future :)

Unexpected

Six months ago, if you were to suggest that my life would be as it is now, I would have laughed and said definitely not.

Little did I know what was in store for me.

Things I never would have expected 6 months ago:

- moving out of my parents house

- living with great roommates

- meeting Austin :) and completely changing my relationship situation

- finding out that our house was foreclosing, quite a shock to us as tenants

- my hard drive crashing

- trying to live on as small a budget as possible

- helping Austin plan out school, now that he's chosen to become a pilot :)

- talking about and starting to plan a wedding at the end of the summer :)

Life has been crazy and nothing like I expected. But fortunately, I don't know everything about my life and I have been led to a completely different place. And I am so grateful!

Going Bananas!

Goodness it's March already. Life has been so crazy, and my blogging time has not been keeping up!

So here's a quick update:

Feb. 20 was Austin's birthday! :) in the middle of the night, my roommate Tarina and I went and decorated his car. We were really tired and like dead quiet, but a neighbor still noticed and came out to make sure we weren't stealing anything. Austin and I spent the day at church basketball and at home with his family.

Feb. 21 was Quinton's Eagle Court of Honor! He is a pretty amazing kid. Kyle got his eagle at 14, which was impressive. Logan beat him and got his at 13 :) so Q decided he needed to top them both and successfully finished all the requirements to become an eagle scout at age 12. That's about the fastest you can go. But that is Quinton. Always filled with energy and ready for a challenge, dressed perpetually with style, of course.

Feb. 25 was a scary day. Kyle and Logan were in a bad accident on their way to school. Both are doing alright now. Kyle was in the hospital for that morning, and will have a long road of recovery, but he is safe. Logan, miraculously, was not hurt. By all counts, he should have been. Our family is so grateful for the Divine protection my brothers and the other 2 students in the car were given. We have been so blessed that the injuries sustained were not any worse.

So now that the past few crazy weekends are over, I am looking forward to a low key one. I think I'll spend it making banana bread out of the 50 bananas that are currently sitting on my counter. They were for snack at work on Wednesday, but my kiddos were in a very non-banana-friendly mood. We had tons leftover! Good thing I don't mind a lot of monkey business ;)

He's a Keeper

This Valentine's Day weekend has definitely been one to remember. Austin is such a great guy :)

Friday night we went out to dinner at RigaTony's, one of my family's favorite restaurants. It looks like the Italian restaurant in "Return to Me." They even play Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. After that, we went to an institute Valentine's dance. I love dancing, and even though it's not Austin's favorite thing, he went along with it. We had a great time!

Saturday we spent the whole day together. He made french toast for breakfast, then we spent a few hours doing homework. Sounds boring, my brothers would say, but actually I loved it. I think out loud while doing homework or writing an article (whenever possible) and we had a good time just joking around with each other. Then (and this is a testament of what a good guy Austin really is) we cleaned my house. Almost the entire house is tiled (minus our bedrooms) and it needed swept and mopped badly. So we worked on that, we cleaned bathrooms and the kitchen. And then, because he knows how much it bugs me, Austin started cleaning off our very dirty stove top. This thing has never been cleaned. It had years worth of burned on messes. Each burner had black rings around it. I have tried tackling it before but never made a noticable difference. But Austin decided we could do it! We bought some Magic Erasers and with alot of elbow grease we got it sparkling clean!

He was willing to clean my stove! I love just spending time with him, no matter what it is. And I am so grateful that he is thoughtful enough to work on a hard, not-at-all-fun, grimy project on his Saturday.

After the stove we made some lunch (well it was practically dinner) and then saw went to the movies to see Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief. We both really liked it. I had read the book and told Austin about it. He is a big fan of the Narnia movies and this is reminiscent.

Sunday he came over for breakfast. I made blueberry and banana nut pancakes. Then church, and dinner to celebrate his brother's birthday.
For Valentines, Austin gave me a Willow Tree statue. I collect them. It is beautiful, and he even sanded and repainted the figure to give her blonde hair :)

A wonderful guy and a wonderful weekend spent with him! I wish I could do it a thousand times over :)

99 Red Balloons

As you can tell, my life gets a little hairy while school is in session. I'm out the door by 6 or 7 each morning for a long block of classes and internship meetings, then onto work at Kids Express and home by 7. Between homework and Austin, my evenings get pretty booked as well! :) Hence the lack of postage on my blog here.
But so much has happened since I last posted! I'll catch things up in reverse chronology...
Sunday Feb. 7 - My 21st Birthday!!!! :) Finally! I'm a bit of an old soul but I look like a teenager. I may regret it in the future, but I always look forward to turning a year older. This year was good. I spent it at my parents house with Ausin and my family, making pizza and watching the Superbowl (not exactly my entertainment of choice, but hey. What are you gonna do?)
When I came home, I found my roommates had filled my room up with dozens balloons, streamers and a pet balloon cow. It was the cutest thing ever! My roommates are so sweet.
Last night, after attempting to write a few articles due for my internship, I finally popped all of them. My floor looked like a balloon battlefield, with gory bits of latex scattered here and there. I have a pile the size of a soccer ball with balloon pieces. It took almost 40 minutes to pop them all and get the candy out of the inside!
Friday Feb. 5 - Skiing in Telluride, Colorado. One of the great ski areas in the nation. Need I say more?
Saturday Jan. 30 - Sailing with my dad, Kyle, Quinton, Janie and Austin in San Diego. This was the first time I'd been sailing and I loved it! I even got to steer :) look out...
Austin and I walked around Seaport Village (one of my favorite places) after sailing and took some cool pictures.
late for class, but they will be posted later!