i can't keep up!

hi. remember how I'm getting married in...what is it?...oh. three days? yeah I shouldn't exactly be blogging. I can think of a lot of things I should be doing, such as:
1-sorting through pictures and making enlargements to display at the reception
2-packing for the honeymoon
3-adding wade to my bank account
4-dropping off a few extra announcements that i STILL haven't managed to get to people
5-getting the oil in my car changed
6-measuring ribbon to tie on the oriental lanterns that are hanging at the reception
7-buying more frames
8-finishing the guest sign-in book
9-buying a video camera
10-giving my friends their bridesmaid dresses...only they are in new york and cali, so I don't know how that one will work...

I feel like there are a million other things to be doing, and i KNOW i will forget something because I'm just so clueless when it comes to the whole wedding planning thing. And I know this might seem like a surprise, but we really do have lives outside of wedding plans. :) Here's what we've been up to this last week:

Monday was Wade's birthday, so I made him dinner and set it up in the canyon. I blindfolded him and took him up and we ate and opened presents and watched a movie on a little mini-dvd player.


Mid-way through the week I found myself an emotional wreck. Blame the wedding, blame the birth control, blame whatever you want, but I needed a break. Cute little Whitney got my shift covered for me and planned a big group date. We all went out to eat at PF Chang's and then went up to Sundance for the full moon ski lift ride. It was so much fun!




On Friday morning, I had my bridal session with Higginson photography. I brought Wade along so the wedding day wouldn't be so stressful. He looked so cute all dressed up! You only get to see one picture though. You'll just have to come to the reception to see the rest. :)

Saturday was Wade's cousin Travis' wedding. Wade was a best man, so he got to wear a tux two days in a row!

Last night, I received my endowments at the Timpanogos Temple. It was an interesting experience and a lot to take in, but I'm looking forward to going back and learning more. I was so grateful to have my mom there right next to me the whole time and to have so much support from family. My Grandma Hardy and my Aunt Kareena and Aunt Marie all came, along with Wade's parents who drove all the way from Logan. I just feel so stinkin' loved!


Also...i was thinking that this is probably a bad week to go off diet coke.

its wade's day!

whenever he sits down and takes off his hat, he rests it on his knee

he blows me kisses when I'm driving away

he says the best prayers

he is quite the cook - one time he took me to the liquor store to make pasta

his whole body jumps when he's falling asleep. ha.

he wants to go to school for the rest of his life

he knows a little something about everything...and if he doesn't, he makes it up
- and i usually believe him

he has lived in Tennessee and Chicago, but grew up in Smithfield, Utah

he had to feed the cows on Christmas morning before he could open his presents

he used to show pigs at the fair

he plays the guitar

his hair gets curly when it gets long

he got drunk on his mission...on accident of course

he also got ran over by a car on his mission

one time, he was running away from a drunk guy who wanted to beat him up,
and he ran into a door and knocked himself out, also on his mission.
He still has a scar on his eyebrow.

none of the three prior incidents were related. no joke.

his definition of camping is getting lost in the wilderness and sleeping on the
ground under the stars

he wrestled in high school - sometimes I find myself in a headlock

he is never afraid to apologize first

he loves vanilla coke

he has a bachelors degree in psychology

his skin gets unbelievably dark after being in the sun
(something he inherited from his momma)

he is obsessed with Indiana Jones - sometimes he thinks he IS Indiana Jones

he is my personal therapist, I completely understand why he is going into mental health
- he's so good at it

he likes to make up outlandish scenarios when we are making decisions,
just to see my reaction, e.g. "let's get a big blow up castle to jump on for our reception"
or "we don't have anywhere to live? thats okay, we can pitch a tent in Cabella's"

he has blue eyes

he loves to wear shirts with cartoons printed on them

his biggest pet peeve is when people drive too slow in the fast lane

he wants to see the Taj Mahal someday

he likes to eat from the vendors on the streets in big cities

he likes to eat at Thai restaurants

he likes to eat at fancy, expensive restaurants

he just plain likes to eat. all the time.

right now, he is reading my old statistics textbook...just for the heck of it

he loves the Kite Runner, just like me.

he secretly cries in movies, namely "August Rush" and "P.S. I love you"
and "Dan in Real Life" and...I should stop embarrassing him...

he uses Adidas aftershave

he wears Hollister cologne that I gave him for Valentine's Day

his middle name is George, after his grandpa

he has two sisters, Tina and Niki, and one brother, Jared

he is the second oldest

he was seminary council president

his family made a cardboard cut-out of him when he was on a mission
so he could be at his brother's wedding

he loves the smell of freshly cut fields

he broke his arm when he was little, apparently "saving his sister's life"
when they both fell off the bed

he knows the types of at least six different kinds of cows.
and he tries to teach them to me. I get mixed up by the spots.

he likes to make up ridiculous new lyrics to the songs we're listening to in the car

he truly believes in sasquatch, aka bigfoot. Ask him about it if you dare,
but expect a two hour conversation.

he was born on this day, twenty-five years ago

June 16, 1983

and i'm so glad he was :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY WADE!

home sweet home

After scouring the city of Boston, Wade and I successfully found our new "home" for the next two years. I do admit that it got quite discouraging, after looking at apartments with mold, apartments with kitchens the size of my bathroom, and apartments that reeked of smoke, we stumbled upon this little miracle:

Don't mind my beautiful hair in this video. We've learned that I need some kind of "humidity crisis intervention", as Wade so lovingly put it. It got really poofy...really curly...and REALLY unmanageable. I apparently have no reason to worry. People on the east coast put no effort into their appearance whatsoever.

This is Wade in the little courtyard area behind our apartment:

I also met with TWO schools out there. The New England School of Photography turned out to be a flop. It was SO overwhelming and required 50 hours a week of work (including dark room processing, which I want nothing to do with) and costs about 55,000 dollars. Sorry. But I don't need to pay someone 55,000 dollars to teach me something I already know how to do. And they only offer certification. I found an art institute though, which offers a bachelors degree in Photography, so when my credits transfer, I'll be halfway there! What a relief!

my little high school grad

As you can see, I was very proud of my little Jordan for graduating from that horrible thing called "high school". I guess he doesn't appreciate my way of showing it.

boston...here i come!

I got a phone call from The New England School of Photography today. I have an interview on Wednesday afternoon, after a midnight flight and a layover in New York, mind you. I'm hoping that my eyes aren't sunken in and red and that I will at least be coherent. Even though the application said that no prior photography knowledge was necessary, I was told to just "throw your portfolio in your bag." Ummm.....let's talk about my portfolio. Yeah, I haven't touched it in approximately 4 years. 4 YEARS, people. So now I get to spend my day printing pictures and organizing them into a proper order, instead of spending that precious time planning out my outfits for the trip.

I don't really know how to feel about going to this school. I am honestly somewhat intimidated by it. They only accept 150 people and they apply from all over the country. So I'm trying not to get my hopes up. But, photography school or not, you better believe I'll make it big one day. :)

identity crisis

As most of you know...I'm a little obsessed with my hair. Ok, not even a little. I'm a lot obsessed with my hair. I probably get it done, oh, like every three weeks. Which isn't helping my current situation. Let me explain:

I started highlighting my hair at the age of 11. It gradually became a habit, to the point where it was almost white. So I lived most my life as a blondie until I was about 19. Then it started falling out, breaking off, and burning up. This called for drastic measures...aka I made myself a brunette. Don't get me wrong. Brown is a great color. It's just not me.

So I have brown hair. VERY thin, brown hair. No worries, this can be fixed. The answer to my problems was hair extensions. I originally planned to get a whole head of them to make my hair like a foot longer. Well, that was going to cost like 700 dollars, and suddenly marriage was thrown into the equation. Hair extensions + marriage = poverty. So that didn't happen. Instead, I got my thin hair filled in in the front with just 7 small, innocent hair extensions clamped onto my own hair with a metal bead. Everything was fine and dandy until one day I ripped one out of my head. That hurt. A lot. Then a few days later, I noticed some red little bumps on my scalp where the hair extensions were attatched. I think my scalp was rejecting them. So my good father went to work with some pliers and a thumb tack and saved me the money of having them removed. I thought my hair was thin before...let's talk about all the hair that came out along with those extensions.

So why do I put myself through such ridiculous things? Who even knows? I think it's just because I was not blessed with long, flowing, thick hair. Let's be honest. I was bald until I was three. My mom had to get my ears pierced so people would know I was a GIRL. But it's just hair right? Too bad every time I look at myself in a picture, I don't see me. I want it blonde again...

I just don't want to be a bald woman at my wedding.

we're engaged!

I knew I was going to marry Wade after our first date. It's true. After ignoring an entire hockey game to talk to me, I was hooked. Two weeks later, we were talking about marriage. So it's not like the proposal was a big surprise to me. I knew it was going to happen sooner or later, I just didn't know when. I also had picked my ring out, I just couldn't decide if he actually had it in his possession or not.

the ring...
A few days before the actual engagement, Wade and I went to pick out his ring. We went to the same guy who sold us mine. I figured Wade was going to just pick up my ring at the same time. Well, he didn't. And I had no clue he had "gone to the bathroom" and instead snagged my ring from some hiding place. As we were driving home, I was giving Wade a hard time about taking so long to give my ring to me. I insisted that he should just tell me if he already had it, and I grabbed his pocket just to see. He frantically grabbed my arm and wouldn't let me touch him... Leaving me to wonder if he really had it, or if he just wanted me to think he had it. Lucky for Wade, I didn't feel anything. But he later told me he was sure I had felt the huge box in his pocket.

mind games...
A few days later, I sent Wade a text that said, "I WANT MY RING!!" He continued to send me texts throughout the day that had me so thoroughly confused. At one point, he had me thinking he was for sure going to propose that night. And then at another point, I thought there was no way he would do it. He kept saying things like, "The sooner you get off work, the better. wink wink." And I thought that if he was so adamant about making this a surprise, he wouldn't flat out say something like that. So I was convinced he was just trying to throw me off and that he wouldn't do it. Once again, leaving me to wonder if he was really going to propose or if he just wanted me to think that he was going to.

wandering...
Wade came to pick me after work and said he wanted to go for a drive. We set off to no where in particular. Wade isn't very familiar with Orem and I told him he had no idea where he was going. Which proved to be true, because we drove all over the place before we ended up at the Timpanogos Temple. We got out to walk around and immediately it started blowing wind like crazy. I was freezing. But the snow on the temple was blowing off the roof and it looked so pretty. So we walked to the front and just looked at it for a minute. Then Wade started saying all this cute stuff like, "I love you...we're getting married here...we're gonna be together forever..." and then he starts fidgeting. And I'm thinking it's for sure about to happen. Nope. He grabs my hand and takes me back to the car.

flowers...
When we get to the car, Wade reaches into the backseat and grabs a bouquet of roses and hands them to me. I asked, "What are these for?" And he told me he felt bad that we had to change the wedding date again. And I had already told him a million times that it was fine. It was weird for him to just randomly give me flowers. Needless to say, I was so confused and getting a little frustrated. So we're driving again, and I'm still stuck on the fact that he gave me flowers for no reason. And he kept giving me silly answers like, "I feel bad that your ring isn't done." and "you're just so beautiful, you deserve them." And he keeps grinning at me so ridiculously! Then he reaches up and turns on the light inside the car. And I finally yell, "Am I missing something here?!" Then I looked at the flowers sitting on the dash and notice a little sparkle coming from the ribbon tied around them.

love...
I remember telling my mom just a few months before I met Wade that I could never understand how you could ever love someone enough to marry them. The idea of love was something I did not comprehend. I've been known to be fickle, a little indecisive, flaky, and confused. But for once in my life, I don't feel like that. For once in my life, I KNOW what I want. I know it with all of my heart. There isn't one ounce of doubt. And it feels good to finally know what that feels like.

I'm so lucky I get to spend FOREVER with Wade. I couldn't ask for anything more.