Thank You!

I feel like it took us forever, but we finally printed our thank you cards. We won 250 free cards from Beautiful Wedding Announcements, who also did our actual wedding announcements. I would definitely recommend them. They were great to work with, even though it took me about seven months to actually cash in on my free cards.

I've been spending the past couple of nights writing these thank you notes, and it's reminded me of just how many people were kind enough to come to our reception and give us gifts. Not to mention those who threw me bridal showers and helped plan and the awesome vendors we worked with. Everything went so smoothly because we had so many wonderful people involved. We are so blessed. So we wanted to say thank you to everyone for everything!

Major Purchases

Nothing has made me feel like more of an adult than getting married and making big decisions with my husband. I made plenty of major decisions as a single adult, but it feels like a bigger deal when those decisions have to be arrived at with another person. Not to mention that a lot of those decisions get a lot more expensive when considering two people instead of one.

The past couple of weeks Andrew and I have made some expensive decisions, but I'm super excited about all of them.

Purchase #1: BYU football season tickets

My brothers, my dad, and I have been getting season tickets together for the past four years, and I love going to games. My dad could only get four season tickets, so this year Andrew and I were planning on getting separate seats. But then my dad found out that with changes made this year, he could buy twelve season tickets, which meant we could sit by them instead of sitting by ourselves. I was really glad that I would still get to sit with my family, but it meant that our tickets cost a wee bit more than I was anticipating paying. But I'm pretty sure it will be worth it, since this year's home schedule is pretty awesome.

Purchase #2: The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Andrew gets a day off work for my birthday, and out of the blue, he suggested using that extra day to go on a weekend trip. His initial idea was to go to Disneyland, which would have been awesome, but then he did more research and found out that a trip to Florida would cost about the same. So we're going to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter! We'll spend two days in Universal Studios Orlando, and I can't wait. I think it will be so much fun. Our trip package includes a breakfast at the Three Broomsticks, and we also got tickets to see the Blue Man Group. It's going to be an awesome weekend, that's for sure.

Purchase #3: Living room furniture

Andrew and I have been thinking about getting new furniture for our new apartment, so yesterday after work we went and looked at a few furniture stores to get an idea of prices and what we liked. We weren't planning on buying quite yet, but at Ashley Furniture, we got a really good deal that we couldn't pass up. And I got an accent chair, which I really wanted. I just think they add a nice touch to a room. I am so excited for the furniture, especially since the store is holding it until we move into our new place, which means we don't have to move it. It also made me super excited to decorate our apartment and make it our home.

I can't wait to make use of all these purchases, though I also hope these are the last of our major purchases for the next little while, at least.

New Look

I have a few friends that blog, and they always seem to have these really cute custom-made pictures as their headers. I've been dying to do that myself, but I could never figure out how. I didn't want to bug Andrew and make him photoshop a picture for me, so I went to the next best thing: Google.

That is where I discovered picmonkey.com, which is a pretty cool website. I didn't have to download or sign up for anything. I could just create a little collage and edit it right there on the site, which was perfect for what I needed.

And now I have my own awesome header! This probably doesn't deserve its own blog post, but you know what? I'm proud of that header! It looks so much better than what I had before. It basically just means that I like my blog a bunch more now. Maybe that will get me to post more often. But I'm not counting on that just yet.

Our First Apartment

It seems that married couples always have stories about their first apartments, so I thought I would try to document mine and Andrew's first home. I was going to take some updated pictures, but then I looked at the ones Andrew posted on Facebook when he first moved in and realized that not much has changed since then.

There is definitely more stuff on the countertops and we have some more shelving (these pictures were taken prior to unwrapping all our wedding gifts, after all), but it's nothing special. That's what happens when you find out you're moving so soon after moving in. We haven't bothered to put much up on the walls or do much in the way of decorating because it's already starting to look like this again:

Things I will miss about this apartment:

• The giant master bath
• The half bedroom turned mini library
• Playing with our landlord's dog on occasion

Things I will not miss about this apartment:

• The abundance of noise that emanates from upstairs (we can hear everything)
• Living in a basement (I need more natural light!)
• The ridiculous misuse of so much space
• The weird shelving in our closet
• The near-complete absence of kitchen storage and counter space
• The abysmal commute to work

That isn't to say that this apartment is a bad apartment. The family that lives upstairs is super nice, and Holly and Blair have been awesome to work with. But there are always going to be things we don't like about a place. And the fact that I seriously cannot wait to move has more to do with my commute than with with the apartment itself.

And speaking of moving, Andrew and I have found a place in Midvale that will hopefully be awesome for us. We move in a mere three and a half weeks, and like I said, I cannot wait. Here are the things I'm looking forward to:

• A 10-minute (at most) commute for both Andrew and me (hallelujah!)
• A two-car garage
• No upstairs or downstairs neighbors (and possibly only one next-door neighbor)
• Vaulted ceilings
• A balcony
• Lots of windows to let in lots of light
• Walk-in closet without the weird shelving
• Kitchen counter space
• Full utility room for our washer and dryer to sit side by side
• Two on-site pools
• On-site fitness facility

I could probably keep listing things, but I'll refrain. I can't tell you how excited we both are to live so much closer to work and to actually settle down someplace for a while. I'm not looking forward to the packing and cleaning and sweating that inevitably comes with moving so much stuff (it's amazing how much crap we have), but it'll all be worth it in the end.