"I'll always bleed Cougar blue..."

Steve Young said that the night BYU retired his jersey in 2003. I'm with you Steve. This commercial gives me loud and proud warm fuzzies for my school.

World Class University Commercial from BYU HD Video on Vimeo.

my redheads

Any of you who know me well know that 2 of my 3 best friends (from childhood... like Maggi and I met "in the womb", really!) are the most beautiful redheads you've ever laid eyes on. I got to play with them and their families in the mountains this weekend. It was completely dreamy and just as my heaven will be. I love them so dearly. I'm the luckiest girl in the world to have friends like them.

my reds

5 kids and counting between the 3 of us. i can't imagine what this picture will look like in 5 years.

i love these girls.

mom and her cute squirrel. i was so proud of her - she did the entire hike to the waterfall without help. it was pretty steep and almost 1/2 a mile. such a tough girl.

van sat on the edge of the fire pit for 30 minutes just playing with sticks. he loved it. so did his dad.

seriously, lukey. what are you hiding in those cheeks? i can't tell you what a sweet baby this kid is. and adorable of course.

em and her "russell" (i call him Russ-Russ, but she insists on Russell). yes, we're planning the wedding. and by the looks on their faces they are too.

we're not going to lie. we're the cutest best friends ever. (at baby luke's blessing last month)

our new home - before and after!

i realize this was a LONG time coming! sorry! we're still not done, but Aaron will be working to finish some of the last tid bits soon, so i'll post more pics then if needed.

just as a summary, before we bought it our house:

• had no interior doors
• had no carpet
• had no lighting in the bedroom or living areas
• had no water heater
• had a less than wonderful kitchen
  
• was covered in a thick layer of dirt
• was generally in bad shape

now.... thanks to lots of hard work from Aaron and my dad (and a few people hired out like countertop guys), it:

• has all of the above missing items + some
  
• has ceiling fans in every room
• has all fresh paint
• has all new 2" faux-wood blinds - it's amazing the difference just blinds make
  
• has no dents or holes in the wall

things we love about our house that you can't tell from pictures:

• we are 1/2 way between UT and CA so we get to have lots of friends and family stay with us. if you haven't yet, please come!!!
  
• location - we are close to family and everything else we could ever want to be close to, but our neighborhood is quiet at the same time
• the man cave - aka the 2-car garage. :)
• at almost 1800 square feet all 3 bedrooms are HUGE!
• all of the bedrooms have big walk-in closets
• i have 2 full linen closets and a laundry room big enough to put all of the laundry inside and close the door
  
• not much of a yard to take care of with Aaron as busy as he'll be when he starts with Deloitte next month
• what big windows it has and how well-lit it is for a townhome
  

on to the pictures:

patio before:

patio after:

before: at front door looking up stairs

after: at front door looking up stairs

before: dining room and kitchen area (turn left as you come in the front door)

after: dining room and kitchen area (turn left as you come in the front door)

yes my curtains need to be hemmed....

we LOVE our appliances - we got all 4 (dishwasher, microwave, range and fridge) for $1600 on craigslist.com - 1 year old. YESSSSS!!!!!!!

before: half bath downstairs (continue down hallway from kitchen)

after: half bath downstairs (continue down hallway from kitchen)

before: laundry room (at the end of that same hallway)

after: laundry room (at the end of that same hallway)

sometimes i tell Aaron that I'm not sure what I love more - him, my washer and dryer or my granite countertops. :)

before: living room (turn right when you come in the front door)

after: living room (turn right when you come in the front door)

looking into the dining room/kitchen from the living room

before: master bedroom

after: master bedroom

our little office space in our bedroom. we're thrilled to finally have separate desks. :)

before: master bathroom and closet

after: master bathroom and closet

we fondly refer to this closet as "the 4th bedroom". seriously. it comfortably fits all of our clothes and more + the pack and play. and it's far enough from our bedroom and behind 2 doors so we won't wake future babies who sleep in there. yahoo!!

before: the kids' bathroom (upstairs)
after: use your imagination. new tub. green walls. brown polka dot shower curtain. cute. pics when it's done!

before: kids' bedroom (currently home only to Em)

after: the kids' bedroom
before: the guest bedroom (Van is here until he an Em can figure out how to operate in the same room)

after: the guest bedroom

and this very cute girl said, "mom! take a picture of me too!" after I photographed the closet. we love her.

the last few weeks

in the last few weeks we've had:

• a visit from the Sampsons. we miss our Cedar City buddies.
• a visit from the Dutsons. when they left with their 6 kids Aaron and I semi-officially upped our desired number of children to 8. we love them!
  
• a trip to UT (w/out Aaron - poor CPA studier) for a baby shower, a bridal shower, a baptism and some serious fun with family and friends.
  

VISIT FROM THE SAMPSONS

Em misses Skye

VISIT FROM THE DUTSONS

there only 3 girls of 13 cousins - they have to stick together

i loved all of the cute little naked kids running all over my house. i need more babies.

TRIP TO UT (pics from Thanksgiving Point Gardens)

van doing his favorite thing - bouncing.

silly boys

squishes from Auntie Cheese

Emery would love to join the Rust family

just one of the boys