Institute is Wonderful

I mentioned in my First Day of School post that I signed up for an institute class. {Did I also mention that I'm technically done with institute? I don't remember but I am graduated from institute and will be getting a diploma whenever I want it!} I am so glad that I did. I went to my first class today and it was wonderful. The class is called "Teachings of the Living Prophets" and I love it already. Today we just got to know each other and then we read some quotes about the importance of modern revelation. It was just what I needed and I feel like it is really going to help motivate me to grow closer to the Spirit and to learn how to see the hand of God in my everyday life. Also, the prophet has asked that we pass around a scripture reading chart during each class and keep track of how many days we have taken the time to do individual scripture study. I think that this will really help me to make an extra effort to read SOMETHING from my scriptures every day. I am so grateful for institute and the opportunity I have to learn more about the gospel, strengthen my testimony, and grow closer to the Spirit so that I can use it to better my life and marriage and to help the people around me. I love spiritual highs! And I plan on keeping this one up throughout the semester. :]


Also we got cute little yellow legal pads to write on so I'm pretty excited about that. {Remember, I love school supplies}

Oh, and I am the designated musician aka pianist even though I barely play. I am glad for the practice though.

First Day of School

August 29th, 2011 is the first day of my last day of school {until I decide I'm bored and want to learn again}!

Here's how my day has gone so far:

Wake up early{ish} to make Race breakfast and to pick out his outfit. :]
Give him a kiss and send him on his way to his first class {Spanish, all the way across campus}
Hang out around the house. Think about wearing a cute outfit. Get lazy and wear my husband's shirt. {I really was going to try and wear a cute outfit for the first day of school but let's be honest...that NEVER happens during the school year.}
Head off to my two classes.
Show up late to both of them because of our new bus route {it's pretty dumb}.
Be really bored going over first day of class syllabus lectures.
Head to the institute for some free food, to sign up for a class, and to find out that technically I should have graduated from the institute last year.
Play the piano at the institute for a while.
Chat with the two{ish} people I know in my classes.
Head home.
Catch up on reading blogs and on blogging some.
And now I'm headed out the door to spend a FORTUNE on all the books and school supplies that we need. BLEH! Wish me luck! {And I'll probably update the blog again later since my day isn't quite over. :]}

Oh, also my phone has decided that it can't connect to the internet, get on my blogging app, edit pictures for me, update any of my apps, etc. So I don't know if I will be able to post pictures for a while. I guess we will see! When I do figure it out though I will post our cheesy first-day-of-school photos. {Mine are in the mirror taken by myself because Race was already gone for class and Race's are taken by me while he ate his breakfast. Haha.}

Last Summer Weekend

School starts on Monday and I am so not ready. I bought some supplies a few weeks ago but I haven't gotten books, I don't have paper or pens or pencils, and I can't even remember what my class schedule is. I will look it up tomorrow and figure out where all my classes are. Luckily though Race and I will be spending one week in school and then we will be heading to Lake Powell for our anniversary weekend! And all of you will be lucky to have three guest posters on my blog! They will be my first ever guest posters so GET EXCITED!! :]

Anyway, this weekend Race and I headed down to his parents' house with his sister and cousin. It's been a wonderful, relaxing weekend. We got to his parents' house around 10 PM last night and stayed up chatting and then today we headed out to Lake Patagonia. We spent the day in the sun swimming, tanning, kayaking, reading, talking, and eating. It was a nice day {just a little hot} and I loved hanging out with Race's family and relaxing. It has been the perfect way to end the summer.

On the way back to his parents' house we stopped at a restaraunt called Velvet Elvis Pizza Company and had DELICIOUS pizza. We got one called Chicken Saltimbocca which had Herbed Cheese, White Sauce, Roasted Chicken, Prosciutto di Parma, Sun-dried Tomatoes, Fresh Basil, Gorgonzola, Asiago, and Mozzarella. How amazing does that sound?! It was super delicious and we downed it super fast.

Anyway, that was our wonderful day and we will be heading home sometime tomorrow. However we will be stopping to see more family in the valley. And then we have to get everything ready for the first day of school. I will be setting out first-day-of-school outfits Sunday night and we will be taking pictures Monday morning. We will look cute. :] It is our last day of college...at least for our Bachelor's degrees. So that's exciting!

Enjoy your Sundays everyone!

This is Lake Patagonia:





Source: http://rv-dreams.typepad.com/rvdreams_journal/2009/01/boat-tours-on-patagonia-lake-patagonia-az.html














Apparently I also got sunburned. I didn't even notice it but then RaceFace pointed it out. And then he so nicely slathered me up with Aloe Vera. Good stuff. :)

Me & My Husband {Twelfth Edition}

Continuing from this post: this post.

Question 12: Favorite part of the day and least favorite part of the day. {Can be anything}


I'll get the bad out of the way and then move on to the good. :]


First off there wasn't anything absolutely terrible. Mostly there were just some funny, weird things that happened. 


1. A bug flew up my nose right before we headed into the temple {while we were doing pictures, 13th picture down, here}.
2. Race was in the process of some crazy tooth surgery and was actually missing a tooth at the time of our wedding. He had a flipper tooth at the time which made kissing over the altar and for pictures a LITTLE bit weird. It was still good though. And, he has a tooth now {not a flipper} so kissing is grrreat! 
3. We got stuck in traffic on our way to our honeymoon destination! 


I think that's all. Those are such small things compared to what a WONDERFUL day it was. 


And now to the good things:


1. Sitting and talking quietly together in the temple before entering the sealing room. 
2. Getting advice from the temple president on love and marriage. 
3. Entering the sealing room to see the faces of so many people we love there to support us. 
4. Giggling lots while taking pictures. 
5. Not being stressed about ANYTHING once I saw Race.6. Making sweet promises to each other for all eternity.

Pretty much everything about our day was good. We didn't have our reception the night of our wedding which we loved. I think that it really helped me not to be stressed about anything. And we were glad that we got to head straight to our honeymoon destination after a quick brunch. It was a good day! And we are coming up on one year next weekend. I can't wait! We are headed to Lake Powell for the weekend and then might be ending it in the valley with my family for a mini family reunion. It will be a good weekend. :]


Oh, for that weekend I was THINKING about having two or three guest posters. I just wanted to see if anyone was interested...and IF anyone is then they should give me some tips on how I would go about setting up a guest post...because I have never had a guest poster or been a guest poster. So, let me know. And have a WONDERFUL weekend!

Edit: I think I now have enough guest posters for next weekend but I LOVE the idea of guest posting and would love for anyone who is interested in doing it at some point to let me know so that next time I'm away I can ask you! You can email me at emsmilesss {at} gmail {dot} com. Thanks so much everyone!

Me & My Husband {Eleventh Edition}

Continuing from this post.

Question 11: Your song and/or the first song you danced to at your wedding: share a music video or lyrics if you can!

Race is super into music and had quite a few songs that reminded him of me. We chose one of those songs for our dance but honestly we didn't even end up having our "first dance" until our reception after all of the guests were gone. I think our true first dance was in our itty bitty first kitchen {it was really a hallway with a tiny sink and stove} while I was trying to cook Race dinner and getting frustrated. He pulled me away from everything and danced with me to no music. It was romantic and one of my favorite memories of being married. Mmm I love that boy! Anyway, the song we chose to dance to at our wedding was "If My Heart Was a House" by Owl City. 

Other songs we considered {some jokingly, most seriously} were: 

"Smother Me" by The Used

"Heaven Can Wait" {acoustic version} by We The Kings

"You Shine" by The Morning Of

"Te Quiero" by Belinda y Otros

I am sure that there were others that I just can't think of anymore. I love dancing with my husband though. And I love when he sings cute songs to me. :] Random side note: At Race's family reunions every year they have an awesome dance with square dancing and the two step and other cool dances like that. Last year while we were engaged we went to this and it was our first dance together and apparently someone asked Race's mom where we learned to dance. I guess they were impressed with our skills that I didn't even know we had. Well, more that Race has. Anyway, I felt really cool after that. And now I want Race to take dance classes with me somewhere. It'd be lots of fun! 

Now I'm listening to our wedding reception playlist. Good stuff. :]

Dear Boys Post

Elise's Pieces is doing this cute post where you write letters to boys. I'm not sure if I'm really allowed to participate since I'm married but I decided to do it anyway. I hope no one minds. It was just such a good idea that I couldn't pass it up.





Dear Brother on a Mission Boy,

Of all my brothers I miss you the most since you've been gone {don't tell the other two}. I cry sometimes because I miss having math and spanish classes with my genius brother and it makes me sad that you barely know my husband...you are doing an amazing thing though. Thank you for your example.

Love your sister, Emma

Dear 2 & 4 Year-Old Boys I'm Babysitting, 

You are stinking cute and I love how much you care for each other. It's also super cute when you give each other hugs and say "I'm sorry buddy." You two would make good big brothers to a little baby sister. {Hint hint to your mother!}

Love your babysitter, Emma

Dear Adorable Nephew Boys,

I can't wait to come visit you. I will come bearing gifts of cute itty bitty bow ties for you to wear to church. Get excited!

Love, Aunt Emma

Dear Little {and by little I mean younger, you surpassed me in height long ago} Brother Boy,

Girls are dumb sometimes even though we always complain about boys being dumb. I hope that when I call you and attempt to give you dating advice/listen to your woes that it doesn't bother you and helps at least a little bit. 

Dear Daddy-O Boy,

Thanks for your health advice and helping me not freak out. Thanks for calling and leaving cute messages on my phone. Thanks for going with me to the temple and then talking to me about it when we realized it was closed for cleaning. And thanks for taking me on a gazillion and one daddy-daughter dates when I visited for a week. Just because I got married doesn't mean I don't need time with my dad anymore.

Love your 'favorite' daughter, Emma

And finally,

Dear Husband Boy.

I'm gonna keep it simple: You make me so happy! 

Love your wifey, Emma

Outfit Post the Fifth

I've come so far! I really thought that I was only going to be doing one outfit post EVER and now I'm on my fifth! Granted, they aren't things I really wear every day--mostly they are my Sunday outfits. Someday I'll convince Race he wants to take pictures of EVERY cute outfit that I wear. :] For now here's another Sunday post. And I made the skirt in these pictures too! I made this one and a short one that's the same style. I can't wait to show you pictures of that one soon. I made those skirts from this tutorial and they really were easy enough for a beginner. I keep amazing myself by sewing cool stuff but really it's all because of people that make such awesome, easy-to-understand tutorials. Anyway, enough of my rambling...here's my outfit!

Breakdown:Shirt {$4}, Cardigan{$3}, & Purse {$6}: Old Navy Skirt: Made by Me, Fabric from JoAnn's {$10}Shoes {$3.50}: TargetEarrings {$1.50: Forever 21  Other Good Things from Sunday: 

• Watching The Cosby Show {this happens pretty much every Sunday}
•  Making more chocolate chip cookies with my "secret" recipe that I'll tell everyone soon
• Watching Free Willy with cousins and Race's sister
• Taking a nap cuddling on the couch
• Learning how to play chess {let's be honest I was not a good sport about this so next time I will actually be a good sport because it will make Race Face happy}
• Listening to the Flash Gordon record
• Doing the dishes TOGETHER
• Wearing my skirt to church and feeling super cute{I wanted so badly for someone to comment on it so that I could brag that I made it--no one did. So now I'm gonna blog about it!}
• Eating Totino's Pizza {senior year in high school backflash}
• And so much more. I absolutely love Sundays.

{Update #1 on the} 30 Day Fun Challenge

1. Make a cute hair accessory for myself.
2. Read a book outside.
3. Take a nap.
4. Read a book while taking a bubble bath.
5. Paint my nails/toenails.
6. Go on a walk around downtown Flagstaff.
7. Write Race a love note {make it cute}
8. Wear an outfit I feel SEXY in!
9. Stay up late to read in bed with Race.
10. Make and eat a delicious dessert.
11. Go see a romantic comedy in theaters.
12. Go to Zumba at the new Rec Center with a friend.
13. Finally use the wax lips Race and I bought on a date FOREVER ago.
14. Take pictures of everything I do in a day .
15. Do my hair super cute {curled, fancy up-do, just anything other than my typical high ponytail/bun}
16. Plan a "fancy date" with my husband.
17. Go star gazing.
18. Take "First Day of School" pictures with Race.
19. Stare at my gorgeous wedding ring and list {in my head or on paper} all the reasons I love Race.
20. Make a skirt.
21. Wear the skirt I made.
22. Plan and/or go on a group date with friends.
23. Play tennis/racquetball with Race.
24. Wear my new swimsuit {$6 at Old Navy!}
25. Go on a bike ride.
26. Get my hair trimmed or cut.
27. Have my sister-in-law/best friend pluck and shape my eyebrows.
28. Buy a new color of nailpolish.
29. Play Michael Jackson: The Experience with Race.
30. Make a smoothie.

Here are pictures of some of these activities:

1. Make a cute hair accessory for myself

I made this headband last week and I have worn it at some point every day since I made it. It's super cute and comfy and soon I'm going to make a skirt out of the same fabric! Cute, eh? Oh, and making a skirt will fulfill another one of my Fun Challenges!

5. Paint my toenails/fingernails













I painted my toenails and fingernails tonight and it was fun until I was heading to find my nail polish and stubbed three of my toes. :[ And then I messed up my fingernail polish by setting up Scrabble. {It was worth it though--I totally won!}

20./21. Make a skirt and then Wear the skirt I make. Check the skirt out in this post. Yeah, I totally made that and then I wore it. And it's so comfy that I might just end up wearing it every day. Or making five more like it in all different fabrics. We'll see. A knit one would be comfy...

22. Plan and/or go on a group date with friends









{I don't have pictures of the date but these are pictures of the gorgeous sunset on the way to the bonfire.}

We went on a group date with Kylie {who is also taking this challenge, with her own personal spin on it} and her husband TJ {I think they were the planners of the date--they are the ones who so kindly invited us :]}, and some other friends {Randon and Jerah, Aubree and Aaron, and Rachel}. Three of these girls were my roommates last year and it was a ton of fun to catch up and to get to know everyone even more. It's fun having other married couples to hang out with. On the group date we went to a bonfire out in the woods and made s'mores and enjoyed the wonderful weather and conversation. 

{The 30 Day Fun Challenge was inspired by Alexis of alexislaughs.com Check her out!}

Something I Love {Fifth Installment}

I love Scrabble. Mostly I love it when I win. Which I did tonight! Race and I are SUPER competitive {at least when it comes to Scrabble and/or Words with Friends} so we get pretty upset when we're losing. But, we still love each other and enjoy the time that we get to spend playing games together. And I supported Race 100% while he was upset and losing and he supported me 100% while I was ecstatic and winning. We're cool that way.


Race set up for the game while I ate a bowl of lucky charms as a late night snack. :]

























Please notice Race covering up the board so no one can see and the crinkled paper with our scores on it that he also didn't want anyone to see {I fished it out of the garbage}--I told you we're competitive! Also, you can just see how intense we are when we play. We have some serious game faces!

On my way

To JoAnn's to buy some fabric to make this skirt except for as a maxi skirt. So excited! This is kinda how my face looks:

{Not a Sunday} Outfit Post

I wore this outfit while lazing around the house today and also when I went to take my husband some cookies and milk at his work. I just made the skirt last night and I LOVE the way it turned out. It's a maxi skirt too which is something I've been wanting for a while! At the time of the pictures I hadn't made a slit in the back so it was super hard to walk in but I fixed that when I got home and now it's perfect! I will probably end up wearing the skirt for church on Sunday so this isn't exactly a non-Sunday outfit post...

Breakdown: 

Shirt-Old Navy 

Belt-Off of a skirt from Kohl's {I also sewed the belt to make it smaller. The elastic was HUGE and I had it bobby pinned to make it smaller before}

Skirt- Made by me! Fabric from JoAnn's

Shoes- I think Wet Seal...I know that they only cost me $6 though

Purse- Old Navy 

Other good things from today:

• It rained all day
• My chocolate chip cookies are delicious
• I got to hang out with my husband on his break at work
• I looked for jobs {I'm not sure if this is a good thing--I hate job searching}
• I talked to my mum and my daddy-o and my sister
• I helped sew buttons on a friend's shirt now that I'm a 'pro' sewer {aka seamstress}
• I got to be lazy and sleep in. 
• There's so much more but basically it comes down to life is good and I am enjoying my last little bit of summer!

Me & My Husband {Tenth Edition}

Continuing the questionnaire from this post:

Question 10: The cake/food: I love food. So tell me about what you had at your wedding!

We really didn't have much food at our wedding/reception. After we got married we had a brunch with all kinds of yummy breakfast foods. It was laid back and delicious. At our wedding reception we had cupcakes, snow cones, dinner mints, and then lemonade and water to drink. I THINK that's all we had but I honestly can't remember. I ate maybe one cupcake and then someone brought Race and I snow cones with lemonade mixed into them. They were delicious! I don't at all regret not eating food at our reception. We spent the whole time talking with all the wonderful people that came to support us in the beginning of our marriage. It was quite the relaxing, low-stress night.

{Sidenote: I have recently been realizing that I am not even close to a food connoisseur like so many other bloggers. I like food just fine but I am not incredibly in love with any foods/desserts. Yeah, I know it's weird.}

I guess I might have Race add something to this post about what he thought about our wedding food although I'm not sure that he really ate much at our reception either. 

Did any of you other married couples realize that you didn't have the time to eat anything at your receptions?    

In Oregon

You sit in your car and they pump your gas for you. It's very different. And a little weird. You can't even pump your gas yourself if you want to--it's illegal!

Because of that, this happened a few years back:

My grandparents were visiting us in Arizona and my mom, my grandma, my sisters and I were heading out to go shopping but we had to stop and get gas first. We got to the gas station where my mom and grandma realized that neither of them knew how to pump gas. They had literally never done it before! My sisters and I were too young so we didn't know how either so my mom had to go inside and ask the gas station attendant for help. I'm sure that made for an amusing story for the attendant. A 40 year-old and a 60 year-old who didn't know how to pump gas. It's crazy to think that you could go such a long time without pumping gas. I am glad that I learned but I also don't mind sitting in my car in Oregon while they pump my gas, wash my windows, and just be overall nice to me. It's a fun change! 

Multivitamins

Does anyone else get sick from taking multivitamins? My husband thinks it's just me because I react weird to other kinds of drugs too but I am sure other people have weird reactions to things also, right? Today I threw up about five minutes after taking my multivitamin. And now I'm hungry {but kinda scared to eat again} since all my lunch ran away from the lame vitamin! It makes me scared to ever take them again...any advice and/or thoughts?

Phone Photos Episode Two

A while back I said that I was going to do episodes of photos from my phone but I only did one. This time around I really am going to try and put up old and new photos from my phone that I haven't previously shared on my blog. So, here goes! 

a.

 

b.

c.

 

d.

 

e.

 

f.

 

g.

a. A never-before-seen picture of me on my wedding day. This was just before getting my hair done. Also, I was talking about the night before my wedding to a friend the other day and it was a pretty interesting night. I stayed up super late getting already and then I ended up sleeping on the floor at the top of my family's home stairs. Then I woke up around 4:30 in the morning to get ready so I could be at the temple by 7:30 am for pictures. Amazingly I did not feel tired at all that day! 

b. My brother and sister-in-law/best friend before they got married.

c. My $8 wedding shoes that I love!

d. The bridesmaid outfit I wore for my older brother's wedding. I WANTED to wear my hair like that but my mom said no. Haha. And it was mixing generations of style so it was probably good that I didn't. But I really like it anyway!

e. This is the first picture EVER taken on my iPhone.

f. This is my dad with his "dinner makings" {he's in charge of dinner on the weekends at my house}. The dinner spread here was mayo, meatballs, and bread. He does better for Sunday dinners but sometimes he really does come up with the weirdest food combos. At least this time he didn't have tortillas. My dad eats EVERYTHING in tortillas.

g. Finally, for today, this is my sister-in-law/best friend on her wedding day. Isn't she gorgeous! I was able to do her hair for her wedding and I loved the way it turned out! I just hope that she did too.

Random Date Night

Race and I have been saving up our change since before we got married. We haven't used it for anything in all that time so we decided to take it all to Coinstar. Before heading over there we made guesses as to how much money there would be. We also had fun dumping all of the change out of the change rolls that we had previously spent so much time rolling all the change up into.

Here were our guesses for how much money we THOUGHT we would have:

• Race--$120.00
• Emma--$117.82

We ended up getting $124.11 in cash and then we got an iTunes giftcard worth $69.16! We were not expecting to get nearly that much money and it was a lot of fun dumping our change into the Coinstar and watching the numbers go up and up. It sure did make us feel rich!

And then we spent it {mostly} on responsible things and enjoyed not having to touch our debit cards for a while.

It was a fun, random little date but we really enjoyed doing something a little different and something that made us $193.27 richer.











  

Something I Love {Fourth Installment}

I absolutely love school supplies.

Notebooks, binders, agendas, folders, pens, pencils, ALL of it.

Going out and buying new school supplies each year helps me to get excited and ready for the new year.

This is my last year of college and I am honestly going to miss buying new, cute stuff each year.

I guess I'll just have to have some little chillens so that I can start buying them cute supplies in just a few years. :]

 Well, here are my supplies that I got this year:

Binder {on sale at Target}



Folders {Target}

 

Agenda {Target}

Aren't they cute?

 

I am so grateful for my education.

And so grateful that I am almost done!!

Something I Love {Third Installment}

Beautiful is the way to describe Flagstaff. I am so grateful to be living here. Race and I would LOVE to settle here once Race finishes law school. {Have I told everyone that law school is Race's plan? I have such a smart, ambitious husband!} Today I went on a walk with the twin girls I am watching right now. They live in a beautiful neighborhood with a walkway going right through a foresty area. Walking through the trees and wildflowers was gorgeous. And the weather was perfect. It's so nice to have this time in Flagstaff right now even if we don't end up being able to settle here someday.

Beautiful trees and sky.

The view on our pathway.

Some pretty wildflowers.

A wildflower one of the girls took a picture of.