Granite!!!

Andy's buddy from school had a man named Barry do granite in his kitchen for a smokin' deal. We decided that since I had a ridiculous week at work and got a bunch of overtime, we would put those funds toward our kitchen makeover! We got a crazy good deal on granite counter tops for our kitchen. It looks AMAZING!!!

We were hoping that we would have the granite in before Bear & Bobbie came down, but instead it was the weekend that they were there! We had to get creative with our meals since we didn't have a sink, and Bobbie was nice enough to help me with food! The guy that came to do the installation had some leftovers of the same granite we had installed, so we had him come back to do our guest bathroom when he came back to finish the back splash in the kitchen. He didn't charge us much for the granite or installation since they were leftovers and I guess he wanted to get it off his hands, and we were more than happy to oblige!

Of course, after the granite was in I couldn't leave the cabinets that color, so I painted them too! Oh how I love house projects! Hooray for good connections!

The Bear's Visit

This past week, Bear and Bobbie came down to visit with Soph and Lucy! We have been so excited for them to come down! They got in late Friday night, after an unintentional detour through Flagstaff, so we stayed in, had some Cafe Rio takeout and did some catching up! We went and played at the park by our house on Saturday, since we were getting our granite in the kitchen (the guy was supposed to come Thursday before the fam came in, but what can you do?). As you can see from the pictures Sophie was quite determined to get in the pool despite the cold water temperature. The air is warm but the pool temperature hasn't caught up yet. Bear could only take so much begging and the softie finally gave in. He tossed Soph into the pool. It was so cold she could hardly breathe. So he scooped her back up and pulled her out shivering. It was tough to understand through chattering teeth but we were able to make out that, according to her, the water was warm and she wanted to get back in.
On Sunday, we went to Freestone park and had a picnic and fed the ducks. Soph enjoyed the park enough that we made a return trip later in the week to feed the ducks again. Best $1 we ever spent!

We hung out around the house on Monday, and Bobbie and I crafted, since we were getting our sink reconnected after a weekend out of the kitchen, and we watched some 3-D movies. I had to work on Tuesday, so Bear & Bobbie hung out with some of their friends from the U of U, and Andy & I met up with them for dinner at Joe's Farm Grill. So tasty.

On Thursday, we went to the "zoo park." The Phx Zoo is a pretty good one, and Soph seemed to love it!

We went boating on Friday with Addi, Blake & the boys, and Blake's dad. He was nice enough to invite us along for the ride! We went up to Saguaro Lake, which was still pretty cold, but the boys and the kids rode on a tube behind the boat. That's right all you in the frozen north!!! Boating in February! They had a great time until right before we were going to call it a day, the tube caught in the front and submarined under! Max and Jack hung on but Andy had to bail. Needless to say, Jack and Max both tapped out after that and we were done. And Jeff's cat like reflexes caught the sinking with their camera. That is Jack's "is this fun or terrifying?" face.

We also had some intense Canasta tournaments, tried out some new facial techniques I found on pinterest (it will take all the gunk off your skin...but may rip off your face!), watched Soph play around in the pool (well, on a step of the pool--it is still too cold!), and just enjoyed having them down here in AZ! We also spent a lot of time trying to convince them to move down here with us, but I think we'll have to keep working on them!

Layover

These past 2 Mondays, I have had the opportunity to visit with Mom & Dad! They went with some friends from B-town to Hawaii, and they had layovers in Phoenix for both of their flights! My boss at work was nice enough to let me take a long lunch so I could go and have a bagel with them for a bit each time. It wasn't for long, but I was so excited to see them! Maybe sometime soon they will come down and stay for a bit longer than a couple of hours...

Cabinet Make-Over

As I mentioned, before we drove up to Utah for Christmas we started painting our kitchen cabinets. You may remember that our kitchen used to look like this:

And after our initial paint job:

In the workshop...

And now, after our cabinet painting...


Slowly but surely, our house is coming along!

Christmas

 

 Andy had his last final on Dec. 16, and we promptly started painting our kitchen cabinets. But that is for a different post. I had to work a couple of days during the week, so on Wednesday we headed up to Utah again! Awesome. We had SO much fun over our Christmas break! We had dinner with Grandpa B, we had a couple of Dominion nights with the fam (aka Brookie & Andy, the Zo's, Meek, Bear & Bobbie), and some Canasta and Skip-Bo battles (I had terrible luck during this trip. Even Mom had a difficult time getting me a win on my card. Sad.) We went and saw the Muppet Movie, Sherlock Holmes, and Mission Impossible, and ate at Moochie's a few times. We had an outing to MAC and H&M, Mom and I went and got pedicures (thanks, Mom!), and we spent every minute possible with friends and family! We went down to St. George on New Year's Eve and hung out with Mom, Dad, and Meek. We went to Brick Oven to celebrate Dad's birthday, and spent New Year's in an intense Skip-Bo battle! Then we drove the rest of the way home on New Year's. It was such an awesome break! Thanks to everyone for making our holiday season so amazing!Here are some pics (again, I am terrible at remembering to take pictures--too busy having fun, I guess! I will try to get better at this!)

Thanksgiving

Andy and I love the holidays. Andy gets a bit of a break from school, and we get an excuse to see our families! My boss at work was nice enough to let me off of work on my birthday, so on Saturday after work, we headed up to St. George! We got there pretty late, I seem to never get off of work on time, but it was awesome to be able to get up to B-town early! We were lucky enough to be able to hit a random snowstorm on the way through Cedar City, good that the Jetta seems to handle okay in the snow, but our windshield washer fluid froze close to Beaver, so we had to pull over and try to thaw it out! The parking lot was PACKED with other people trying to do the same thing. Apparently they don't have -20 windshield washer fluid as a standard in AZ. Who knew. Anyway, we made it safe to B-town and the party began! On Monday, we celebrated my b-day by going out to lunch at Jason's Deli. We met up with Mom & Dad, Brock, Linds & the kids, Bear and Bobbie and the kids, and the Zo's. It was so much fun! I am always so happy to see people in Utah! We had Pier 49 Pizza up at my parents for dinner and played games with everyone! Awesome. On Wednesday, Andy and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary! I can't believe that it has been 7 years. It makes me feel old. We celebrated our anniversary by eating at some of our favorite SLC restaurants! We had lunch at Moochie's, dinner at Crown Burger, and, to keep up with our tradition, dessert at the Melting Pot. We have gone to the Melting Pot every year for our anniversary, and we're keeping it up! It sounds like a pretty fat anniversary, and I guess it was, but it was awesome!

We had Thanksgiving dinner at Aunt Dawna's house, and it was tasty tasty tasty as usual! That family knows how to throw a party! And we are always happy to partake of all of the yummy food :) It was fun to see the whole fam!

On Friday, we went to El Matador to celebrate Evan's birthday and Andy went to the U of U football game with Tony.

I think they froze. Probably more noticeable since the U played TERRIBLY. Embarrassing, really. Oh well. On Saturday, we went to see Grandpa B and went up to Logan for some Frederico's and up to Lewiston for the grand tour. It is always so great to see Grandpa B, he so awesome. We started our voyage home after we got back from Lewiston. We always love our visits back to Utah. We are so grateful for such awesome friends and family that always make us look forward to visits!

Brookie!

This past week, Andy and I were busy! It was a great week! On Monday, after Jack's birthday party, we drove up to Las Vegas for an Emergency Medicine conference that Andy wanted to go to. We were there until Wednesday, and then we decided to drive home a day early. Brookie flew in on Thursday for a work thing, and I got to hang out with her when she wasn't in meetings! I picked her up on Thursday and we got some Cafe Rio takeout for lunch and gave her a tour of our house! Then we went shopping at World Market (I think she was a fan--who wouldn't be?) and we made some soup for dinner. Apparently we appeared to be struggling, because Andy said that we looked like the 3 Stooges trying to make dinner. Since there were only 2 of us, does that mean it looked like we were struggling as much as 3 people would be? Sounds like a lot. Anyway, the soup tasted fine, and I didn't taste any pieces of melted plastic in my soup (left a bag of shredded cheese on a hot stove--woops). I picked Brookie up after work on Friday, and we watched a movie. On Saturday after Brookie's meetings were done, we went shopping again! We checked out the Scottsdale Fashion Square Mall (hooray for H&M and MAC), and then I introduced Brookie to the Container Store. That place is AMAZING. I am happy to say that Brookie enjoys it as much as I do. Some people just think I'm crazy because I get excited about organizational things.

After our shopping excursion, we got takeout from Joe's Farm Grill and finished our movie from Friday. Sunday, Brookie and I had a rousing game of Domino's (I won!) and I took her to the airport. We were so excited to have her down here to visit for a few days! Love you Brookie! Thanks for the visit! Can't wait for you to move down here (hint, hint!)