short, sweet, to the point

it's been a busy last few weeks (as you can tell with my lack of posts). so a quick recap with as little details as possible to catch you up on whats going on without boring you.

May 14- parents came into town to help us move into our new apartment

May 15- MOVE OUT/IN DAY!!!!!! we moved to a 2 bed 2 bath apt. it's SO much bigger and so much nicer. we are really enjoying it! i'll try to post pictures soon.

May 23- we celebrated our 1 year anniversary! i can't believe a whole year has gone by! it's been one of the most challenging, exciting, and fun years of my life. on our wedding day, it was hard to imagine that i could love landon even more, but i love him more now than ever! on our anniversary, we went to church, lunch, and then just spent the day together shopping, watching a movie, eating our cake, and just relaxing. we exchanged gifts and landon gave me an AMAZING gift! i'll post pictures of that soon too! we have a friend who is quite the artist, so landon gave him one of our wedding pictures to paint to hang on our wall. it is awesome!!!!

May 28- we came to friona for my sister's high school graduation. my parents are down to 2 left in the house! it's only been 1 day, and it's been so nice being here with my family. i haven't seen them in 2 months.

also, my grandad, P, had a stroke on monday and has been in the hospital. he isn't doing very good, so please keep my family, especially my mom and grandmother in your prayers.

also, my mom's brother has cancer and we have recently found out that it is worse than we even knew. so right now really is tough of my mom and grandmother having to be the strong ones.

praying for peace.

Letters

Dear Husband, Thank you for dancing with me this morning while you were on hold with the Apple Store and they were playing Techno Music. You are a good Techno Dancing partner.

Dear Steroid Shot, you are a lifesaver. not only to me, but to my husband too. Now he can breathe for the first time in 3 weeks and my trash can won't be filled with so many kleenex.

Dear Blog and Blog readers, I'm sorry I have neglected you lately. I'll try to do better.

Dear Tomato Factory, Do you really work?? I'm tempted to try you out, even though I'm not a huge fan of tomatoes.

Dear Marriage, It's coming up on a year. Where has the time gone? You are a lot of fun, but I will give all the credit to Landon since he is the reason for the marriage and the fun.

Dear God, You are BIG...a lot bigger than me. Thank goodness!!

camping..like hardcore camping

for the last couple of months, we have been planning a camping trip with landon's parents and a couple friends to Arkansas. landon went back in October and wanted all of us to experience it!

When i say we went camping, i don't mean like we had a picnic table and a little grill to cook hamburgers and hot dogs and we just pitched a tent and then took showers in the bathroom building a few yards away. No, this was real camping, like hiking through a mountain while carrying huge packs on our backs, we pitch a tent in the first clearing we see after hiking 3 and a half miles, and eat peanut butter and crackers, beef jerky, and freeze dried food with water from the river.

anyways, i was excited to be able to do something with landon that he is so passionate about and get to hang out with his family for the weekend, but i wasn't too sure about not taking a shower all weekend, not eating a real meal all weekend, going to the bathroom outside all weekend, and sleeping on the ground all weekend. but i have to admit, it was a LOT more fun than i thought it would be! i will definitely do it again, and landon and i talked about how it will be fun to take our kids to do stuff like that one day. it was just nice because there were no distractions, our phones didn't have service, it was just us and the bears.

we hiked a total of 9.6 miles up and down and around the mountain, and as sore as i was when we got done and the next day, i have to say that it was a very nice relaxing weekend.

the whole group

landon and his uncle Chris. they like to match. and i think landon looks hott!

our fire man doing his thing

God is so creative

the girls!

me and Amy

look how big my pack is!

me and Tami

for women only

Women of all kinds, married, dating, engaged, or just wanting to be a good wife to your husband someday, please please please read this book!

I am always looking for a new good book to ready, but i more enjoy fiction rather than "self help" kind of books. I was walking through Barnes and Noble one day just getting ideas of different books to look for at the library. I picked up this book to scan the pages and I instantly wanted/needed to know more.

I am continually learning how to be a good wife, how my husband thinks, and how I can better serve him. This book is written by a christian woman, Shaunti Feldhahn, who did random surveys of men (christian church goers, married, single, etc) and wrote this eye opening book for us women. It's a quick/easy read but it is extremely helpful in the life of a woman who is still trying to figure out the opposite sex.

I told Landon that I was going to try to read this book once a month. He asked me if he was "that" bad. Let me clear up that this book is not at all about bashing men! It is a book of explaining God's creation, how he created them, and how we can better understand them. Reading it once a month will continually remind me of things I may forget or get frustrated about.

I'm excited to continue learning to understand my husband. It's an exciting adventure:)

Guys, there is a book for you too, For Men Only! :)

Easter weekend

I saw a friends facebook status post that said this:

Sometimes I find the Easter story too familar to understand it at the appropriate depth

I can't help but feel the same way. I've heard the Easter story for as long as I can remember. It's such an awesome story of grace, redemption, and love, but I don't think I fully understand what that really means. I'm so thankful that I have grown up in a Christian home and have experienced the love of Christ from an early age, but sometimes I feel that it's the new Christians that truly understand and appreciate the Easter story and what all it means.

This Easter weekend, I have tried to really focus on what this weekend is all about. I saw another friend's facebook status yesterday with the chorus of a song that I hadn't heard in a while. After I listened to it, I decided it is one of my new favorite songs. It tells the story of Christ's love for us, what he did on the cross, and how he made a way for us to be in a complete loving relationship with him. It's such an awesome song, and it tells the depth of what this weekend is about.

this is a shout out blog

so i have these friends...great friends actually who this post is dedicated to. in the post, i'm going to make an ACROSTIC of their name and something interesting/unique about them/my relationship/memories with them. ok lets get started.

C:is for cookies. even though i don't like chocolate, Karen make the BEST chocolate chip cookies!!! oh my gosh their delicious!! i can usually eat 1 without having too much chocolate, and sometimes, she even saves a little dough without as many chocolate chips just for me!

L: is for Listing, listing items on ebay, that is. that is what karen does, and she is really good at it, and she lists every week with her little tape measure and glasses...she looks so cute!

A: is for Awkward. This family is VERY open, and when i say VERY open, i mean VERY open. I'll just leave it at this: hey remember last week in the kitchen? haha

R:is for Rewind. Oh the joys of recording, like tonight when we should have rewound it to watch Kate dance again just so we could laugh again! If we rewind, it's usually just have another good laugh...which we do often.

K: is for KATIE. OMG I LOVE HANGING OUT WITH KATIE SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

S: is for SSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHH. because that is probably the most used word on monday nights at their house watching either The Bachelor or now Dancing With The Stars.

HOP YOU LIKE IT:) LOVE YA'LL!!!!!!!!!

2 bed 2 bath

mine and landon's lease on our apartment is up at the end of May. we have been debating for a while on what we wanted to do, but knew that we did NOT want to stay here. we looked at a few houses online, but finally decided that it would be smarter to just get another apartment, a little nicer than the one we are in, and save for a house hopefully next year.

last week, we went to look at a couple apartments at Paces Crossing. we knew we wanted something a little bigger than what we have no. i feel like we just have a lot of clutter laying around our apartment now because we have no where to put it. we looked at a 1 bed 1 bath with a den area (which could be converted into another bedroom or office) that we really liked. the kitchen was bigger, the bathroom was bigger, the living/dining room was bigger. we then ventured over to the 2 bed 2 bath apartment. at first i was thinking to myself "do we really need a 2 bed 2 bath for just 2 of us who sleep in the same bedroom? would it be worth it to pay a little more money?" landon and i went home and talked about the 2 choices and we have decided that we will probably go with the 2 bed 2 bath for the following reasons:

1. it's bigger, all over!

2. THE MASTER BEDROOM HAS A WALKIN CLOSET!!!!!!!

3. the extra room has a big closet in it for storage

4. we can put a futon/bed/couch and desk in the extra room so that if my family ever came to visit, they wouldn't have to get a hotel, and they could just stay with us. that would cut a big expense.

5. i didn't realize until we started talking about the 2 bed 2 bath how much i would like my own bathroom!!!

6. more room to decorate:)

i'm sure there are plenty of more pros to getting the 2 bed 2 bath, and i'll find that out later:)

i'm excited about getting a new place! it's so odd that we have almost been here a year, which means we have almost been married a year! we have been talking about what we want to do for our anniversary. anybody have any ideas for a fun/inexpensive getaway for 2?? we would rather drive somewhere to save some money. let me know if you have a suggestion!!

the only bad thing about moving is packing...........YUCK!