The Story of the Stockings

This is not a inspiring story, but one of the lessons to be learned when your imagination is bigger than you abilities. I enjoy crafts when I have oodles of time and nothing else to stress me and when I can give them away so I never have to look at them again. By the end of each craft, I hate and despise it and never want to see it again because I know exactly where each and every flaw is. So why is making Christmas stockings a good idea? It's not and now I have to look at them every year for who knows how long.

So let's back up a month or so ago when my crafty sister sucked me into her plan. Let's make stockings with cute little designs and danglies and bows and bedazzling and... Lesson #1: Listening to your crafty sister is never a good idea. So we gather up the JoAnns coupons and our multitude of ideas and set out. After an afternoon of indecision we left with a bunch of stuff that I had no ideas what to do with. Lesson #2: 2 indecisive girls, 2 grumpy kids, and too many ideas and options are not a good mixture. Bring on the stress and grumbling. The one good thing I did was to buy quality stockings from Kohls, so they didn't end up looking like a foot was already stuck in it like Stephanie's did. After more whining about sizes and designs, I settled on a Christmas tree and snowflakes. Now what to do with these shapes. My decision was not the best. Lesson #3: Metallic thread, fleece, and blanket stitching should never be in the same thought. After a week of blistered fingers I ended with finished shapes that were not cut even, wouldn't stay flat, and looked nothing like what was in my mind. Let's skip the 3 weeks that I hated them so much I didn't even look in the direction of their secluded corner. Finally I realized Christmas was a week away and I needed something that I could claim was a stocking. I took everything to my sister's because this whole fiasco was her idea anyway and I am not creative that I need her approval on everything. She glued it all on in her whimsical way, my way of saying not straight or in an orderly fashion, stuck a few extras on, and went crazy with the only thing that fixes anything. Lesson #4: Glitter glue makes everything look better. I had the thought to use it when we first started, but it was what my mom would do and I want to hold off a few more years before I completely have her train of thoughts. However, I gave in and glitterized the stockings.

So you are probably wondering what these Christmas disasters look it. Actually they didn't turn out too bad, thanks to Stephanie. Have a look.



So what if I want them to say Mom and Dad in a few years? I think I am out of luck, those things are stuck on good.

Our First Christmas Tree

On Saturday we set out to find a small, cheap Christmas tree (a Charlie Brown tree). Good thing we had a gift card to Tony's Grove Nursery and they had poor people trees outside in a lonely corner. We found the one just for us and brought it home, tied to the top of the car. In Bob's excitement to get it off, he stabbed himself in the hand with his pocketknife. The tree was abandoned for a moment while my fabulous first aid skills kept Bob from bleeding to death. After filling the stand and adjusting the angle, we had a tree to look at.


Bob headed off to work and I put the lights on. I am very particular about these kinds of things and I didn't trust Bob to do it my way :) Sunday night, we officially trimmed the tree with ornaments from our pasts. We had a good time sharing the memories associated with them.

Yay for our first Christmas!

6 Months

As I think back on our six months of marriage, I think of all the wonderful little things that Bob does for me to show his love. Here are some of those things:

1. He let me have the parking spot, while he has to park on the road.
2. He brings me chocolate almost every time he goes to the store.
3. He goes to the store for groceries when I don't want to.
4. He sends me texts through out the day to let me know he is thinking of me.
5. He attempts to help clean around the house. I appreciate the effort even if I have to go back and do it again.
6. He doesn't complain about eating Hamburger Helper or some other boxed meal.
7. He has really cut back his eating out and takes peanut butter sandwiches to work.
8. He lets me hold the remote every once in awhile.
9. Sometimes he remembers to put the seat down without me asking.
10. He tells me so everyday.

I love you Bob!

A busy, busy fall

Well shucks, these past couple months have gone by like a whirlwind. Last time you heard from us school had still not started, and life was going by at a lazy relaxing pace. Well that has all changed! I have barely had time to do anything since I officially started my internship. I began in late August, and it has definitely been a learning and growing experience. If you don't know I am at the Bear River Substance Abuse division of Bear River Health Dept. which serves Cache, Rich, and Box Elder counties. I have seen a lot of the sad things that happen when people get themselves caught in the web of addiction and substance abuse. On the other hand, I have seen how wonderful it is when people commit to turn their lives around and change their way of thinking. I do this about 16 hours a week, and when you combine that with being a full time student, working about 25 hours a week, being an elders quorum teacher, helping run the Utah State chapter of NASW (National Association of Social Workers) and above all keeping my dear wife happy (which isn't too hard to do since we love each other so darn much!), it makes one feel a little worn out at times. But it has been a wonderful experience learning about myself and preparing myself for the future. I have had a number of really exciting things happen this beautiful autumn season

1. I have had an excellent time fishing, I may not have had as much time these past couple weeks, but autumn is magic time for fly fishing, and there have been days where I've caught them 15 at a time ( I let them all go though). I may be going fishing with my father in law this Friday at East Canyon reservoir, I'll let you know how it goes!

2. I have discovered Smokin Blues BBQ restaurant. Went there with friends Robert "Rising Sun" Kitteridge and Kyle "Alpine Tamer" Apblanalp. Unfortunately Josh "Early to Bed" Thompson couldn't join us. I think about Smokin Blues all the time. I think about the delicious BBQ sauces gently caressing the slow cooked pork ribs, in their secret recipe dry rub. This heavenly vision haunts me by day, and flits through my dreams at night, like a delicious aromatic phantom. I have told Amber that once I finish this insanely busy semester I am going to treat myself to a full rack of ribs and triumphantly proclaim my victory over finals and hunger!

3. My dear parents were able to go on a much needed vacation to Hawaii. I guess my dad was pretty wild from what my mom was saying. I'm glad they could go since my mom works so very hard managing the Operating Room at Alta View Hospital. My dad, for those of you who don't know, has had a very strange chronic illness for almost 7 years now. Everyday he struggles with it and it can be very discouraging both to him and to those who love him so very dearly. From what I've heard they had fun, and that makes me happy.

4. I can watch MonsterQuest and shows about ghosts whenever I want! A little while ago, Amber's good natured sister and husband let us borrow their wii, and also let us share the streaming netflix with them. With such shows on netflix, I can show Amber or as I like to call her "the mean skeptic who doesn't believe in anything cool" that there are interesting things out there in the world. I will go over some of those!


Bigfoot! Did you know that when they did a computer analysis of this video they actually found that there were facial movements being done by the creature, which would have been very difficult to do if there was a mask. I know that there are several theories about how this is a hoax, and some folks have even claimed they were the ones in the suit (that's what Amber thinks), but monsterquest showed me some interesting things that could prove otherwise. I wonder if we're looking at Cain right now...

















Lake Monsters! This here is supposedly Champ, a plesiosaur like creature. This is the "mansi photograph" which was taken in the late 70's. Interestingly on Monsterquest one researcher shared some sonar that she recorded while researching the lake. She recorded what sounded like whales or dolphins clicking at each other, but when compared to such animals, the sounds were distinctly different. What could be in lake Champlain? Amber says this picture is a log and the clicks were just sounds from another ship doing sonar. Oh silly Amber!








Giant Birds! Apparently giant birds were being sighted in Illinois in the late 70's and there was even a case where a small boy was momentarily snatched by one. Man is that scary! Amber didn't quite know what to say (she didn't believe it though). If it was me and I was near a giant birds I'd have two thoughts. First, I'd hope that I didn't have any birdseed on me. Second, I'd want to be at my Gpa Bob's house, he has lots of shotguns (and ice cream).




Ghosts! Amber doesn't believe in ghosts, but I do. I could tell a few ghost stories but I won't because I don't want to scare you away from our blog, I like you. However ever since we got married kitchen stuff sometimes get misplaced in different drawers, usually on the nights I do dishes. I of course am a guy and as a former bachelor can say with confidence that I know where stuff goes. So if anything, I think a ghost is misplacing things to make me look foolish in front of Amber! I try to tell Amber this but she just says I need to do more dishes to memorize things. My reply is I don't think it would be a good idea for me to do dishes if there is going to be paranormal activity involved.

Now as of writing this Amber said she didn't want to write anything, because she has nothing to say. being her husband I feel to let all of you know that I could not ask for a better wife, who loves me even though I have lots of flaws. She is such a strength to me and I have a hard time not smiling when I'm with her.

Lagoon-A-Bummer

We thought we needed one last adventure before we started school and what an adventure it was. I had to leave school early praying that we would have power in my classroom before back to school night the next night. We headed down to Lagoon for the day and it's closed. We sat in the parking lot with 4 other cars looking at the closed sign. I guess Davis County schools started that week which took most of Lagoon's workers and players, but who are we to imagine that on a hot August day such as this they wouldn't welcome us. Well, we couldn't just wasted a day, and the gas, so we stopped at my parents' for some good ideas. The best we came up with was the Hill Aerospace Museum. It was free, so why not. Of course it is run by a bunch on old men who need their dinner by five, so we had 20 minutes to run around two galleries of planes and other flying stuff. I'm sure there was some neat stuff, if we would have had time to stop and look. We quickly got some pictures to show we actually did something. My parents then took us out to eat, so it was a good day out of Logan. Don't we look happy.

Oh, in case you were wondering, they did get power to my classroom 6 hours before Back to School Night. That is that happiest I've been about school.

End of an Era

Well it's been quite an eventful summer, not only is it our first summer as a married couple but Bob has been quite busy working on getting volunteer experience both to prepare for grad school as well as have good life experience. Bob has volunteered this summer at a nonprofit agency in town called Bridgerland Literacy. The goal of this agency is to help people in the community increase their literacy in reading, math, and other areas that will help them do well in both their academic and personal lives. Bob initially started as an assessor, testing students' progress during their time at Bridgerland. Bob eventually volunteered his services at Bridgerland's summer reading club, which was for children in the community ages 5-12. The theme of the club was the ocean, and each week had an ocean related topic, like sea animals or pirates. Different age groups had different names, and Bob was one of the group leaders for the 9 year old group, the palm trees. It was a very fun experience, and the kids in the group were awesome!

Family Home Evening

Here is our first post. We are excited to start our blog. Neither of us are good journal writers, so we decided that a blog would help us be better at it. We began dating June of 2009 and got engaged that November. Unfortunately we are not very good picture takers, but we did get a few good ones to show.

Here is us at Halloween. Our costumes really are accurate of our inward selves.

Us at Temple Square. The lights were bright, but our love for each other is even brighter.

Us with Amber's family. They were instantly won over by Bob's quick wit and sunny disp0sition.

Christmas with the Lloyds. Some of the best gifts were given, namely a Willow lunchbox!

Even though these were taken after we were married. We still have fun dating. Bob thought I was going to throw the pole in the lake, but I ended up with two fish and him with none. He is very good at putting the slimy worms on and getting the icky fish off my line. Plus he is a handsome fisherman.