Our First Batch of Homemade Deliciousness!

When I say Jeffree is amazing, here's what I mean...

This was his second week of making homemade wheat bread. He even grinds the wheat. And it's delicious! It's so fun to have homemade baked goods to enjoy. One of the loaves looks funny because the dough expanded outward in the silicone pan. But it's cute.

Today in church, our High Councilman was talking to the brethren about all the things they should thank their wives for. Among those were doing the dishes, laundry, keeping the house clean, etc. I kept whispering thanks to Jeffree for doing all those things for our family, and I thought, man, I could do a way better job of being a wife! Jeffree does everything, and he does it because he loves me, not because I ask him to. The speaker then told the men to help their wife with the dishes. So tonight, I helped Jeff with the dishes. After he made Sunday dinner, of course.

Only 5 1/2 weeks left of student teaching and I'll be a college graduate. Then I'll have to start taking Housewife 101 classes and learn how to take care of my husband. I hope I meet the prerequisites!

Two is Better Than One

Since it wasn't our first Valentine's Day, titling our blog as such would be false advertising. It was our first married Valentine's Day, and it was wonderful.

It started Friday night with a trip to Idaho Falls. We ate at Olive Garden, then enjoyed an evening at the Idaho Falls Temple.

Saturday morning, this was awaiting me at the breakfast table. The hearts say things that Jeffree loves about me.

Saturday night I tried decorating cinnamon bears for Jeff. The tux was cute till I tried to add pants. It looks more like a grass skirt.

Sunday, I gave this bouquet to Jeffree. It didn't turn out near as cute as I hoped. I redeemed myself that afternoon with decorating our bedroom.

Jeff had this waiting for me after my Sunday nap. There were hearts leading to this little display on the table.

One of the best things about our day was listening to Elder Quentin L. Cook. He came and spoke to our Stake. We were pretty close to the front, so that was neat. Our other claim to fame is that we parked right next to him. We speculate that he slipped on the icy parking lot and caught himself on our car. We were about 10 seconds away from meeting him, but it was neat to listen to him talk to just our Stake.

Jeff is so wonderful and I love him so much. He always goes overboard to make our little family so happy and comfortable. And he is a perfect example to me of showing love to one's spouse. Our holidays are always so special because of him. Hopefully I'll get as good at it as he is someday.

Our First Blog... In months!!!

I'd like to dedicate this extra long post to Orchid Christensen, one of our dearest friends. She has been hounding me to update my blog... So Orchid, this is for you!

Jeffree and I are having a wonderful time in Rexburg. We're enjoying snow, ice skating, scraping the car, teaching, student teaching, and exhausting our winter wardrobes. Here's what we've been doing the past few months...

Our First Thanksgiving: We spent it with Jeffree's family, but got to spend time with both families. It was different to be the family that no one had seen for so long!

After a crazy semester, we decided to take a picture of all the books that were required for me to read for my 19 credits. Here they are arranged by class.

After a stressful semester, Jeffree and I attended our first homemade school dance. Jeffree decorated his classroom and surprised me with the cutest dance ever, complete with refreshments, a punch bowl, a theme song, lights, streamers, and a poster made by his 3rd grade class. He never ceases to amaze me. He's so wonderful.

Our first Christmas... Spent at Lori's house, but with plenty of chance to be with both families. We had fun creating our own little Christmas traditions.

I hope that our tilted Christmas tree isn't a tradition, but here it is... Our First Christmas Tree!

Exchanging gifts Christmas Eve.

My first birthday as a married woman. We went to Utah for the wedding of one of my best friends since forever. When we got home on my birthday, this was waiting. Jeffree said he wished he could take credit, but it was definitely Orchid who'd gone all out for me.

In the envelope on the door, I found this invitation to a Hannah Montana themed party. Clever, Orchid. Well done.

Jeff had my presents wrapped along with a Bday message written in popcorn. He is so cute. I left it on the counter for quite a few days.

Orchid made me a funfetti cake with rainbow chip frosting - my favorite. It's a heart. I don't think it's supposed to be broken. :)

We had dinner with Alex's parents and family (we LOVE them).

And here's what I enjoyed for dessert...

Naturally, Jeffree Dean serenaded me with his guitar.

The next day was my birthday party. The Johnson's, Brantingham's, McMurry's, Christensen's, Jeffree, and Caitlin all showed up to make a wonderfully fun event.

The cake was divine, the company even better.

Here's a shout out to Jeffree, who always does his best to make my days wonderful. I love him so much. While I am 1 year older, and wiser too, he continues to prove himself more loving, giving, selfless, kind, thoughtful, and downright hilarious. Being married to him is the best thing in the world. We've almost been married 7 months, and we continue to fall in love with each other every day.

I love you, dear. Love, me.

Our First Double Date...

...with the Johnson's, that is.

The girls were in charge of dinner. We started the evening with our own version of Olive Garden. After a divine meal of Herbed Italian Sausage and Pasta, breadsticks, and a gourmet salad, we were off to the Olivlympic games.

Here we are after the first event: Javelin Throw (with straws). Seth won this one.

Other events (and winners) included the discus (Seth), the Balloon Blow and Pop (Jeffree), and the "Shot-put-it-in-the-bucket" (Lori).

Here we have Lori making Jeff feel better about disqualifying in every round of the discus.

And here are the Johnson's: Seth and Katrina. She's admiring his mad olivlympian skill.

We're not sure who won the final event. Seth felt bad that Katrina hadn't won yet, so he kept trying to push me or trip me to keep me from winning. It's hard to run backwards while rubbing your belly and patting your head, especially if someone is clubbing your kneecaps and your hot husband is distracting you. Luckily everyone came out physically intact, as you can see below.

It was a fun evening... Oh, we almost forgot to mention our cheerleader, Alexis. She is Seth's and Katrina's 6 week old baby girl. She accompanied us throughout the date. We had frozen hot chocolate (we made the hot chocolate before the games, left it outside the door during the games, and when we came home it was frozen), and the boys handed out the awards.

We're so blessed to have such wonderful friends up here in Rexburg. We LOVE the Johnson's so much! Good friends are such a tender mercy and we are abundantly blessed with the most wonderful friends! And while we're being thankful for wonderful friends, we want to give a shout out to our other FCF's (the married version of BFF). We have the most AMAZING neighbors, Alex and Orchid. They are even more crazy and loud than we are (hard to imagine, we know)! They are always so helpful and wonderful and thoughtful.

Last night, we went on a Snow Walk with our other FCF's Matt and Jaime McMurry. Jaime is an ol' roommate of Lori's and Jeff and Matt go way back :) The McMurry's are some of the most INSIGHTFUL people we know. We love having deep discussions with them.

We also want to give a shout out to Lori's miraculous student teaching placement: Madison High School in Rexburg, Idaho. What a miracle that she doesn't have to drive 45 minutes, but instead gets to be 2 blocks away from Jeff's school. Heavenly Father continues to pour out His blessings upon us.

Last night, as we were falling asleep, Jeff said, "Being married is real neat." That about sums it up. We LOVE each other, we love being TOGETHER, and we love all of the DIVINE experiences we are having as a married couple.

Our first Halloween

While we aren't the biggest fans of Halloween, we thought we would milk it for what it was worth. Saturday was our temple day, so we wore black and orange church clothes.

For lunch we went with the theme and tried to make our dinner as black and orange as possible...

Next stop, the ward activity. Lori went as Miley Cyrus and Jeff went as Billy Ray Cyrus. We couldn't find a mullet wig, so no one really understood. Lori had to be careful not to kiss Jeff, not only because he was supposedly her pa, but also because when she kissed him, it smudged his flavor saver/soul patch.

The activity lasted 4 hours for us, because we are the new ward activities chairmen. We got to set up and then clean up. But the activity was a success and we're enjoying "our first calling."

Tune in for next time's post... "our first 'Snowed in? No problem!' theme date."

Our first escape to a fantastical world...

Come with us now and experience the fantastic world of Shirlibithia. The legend dates all the way back to September 19, 2009. As legend has it the only way to this new world is to set up a magic tent inside your apartment. So that is exactly what we did in our "Camp to Shirlibithia." We came out of the tent to find a whole new imaginary world with surroundings similar to Rexburg... actually, very similar. We traveled through this whole new world and found some secret artifacts. Shortly thereafter we viewed Bridge to Terabithia on the "magic stone" we found. The "thia" (popcorn to Earthlings) was delicious. We camped there overnight and woke up to our apartment and sore backs. It was neat as a pickle.

Our First Cruise

After months of saving, we were finally able to afford our "dream vacation": Europe! We went on a "cruise" yesterday to a few of our favorite countries. Our first stop was Germany, where we enjoyed German pancakes! Next it was France, with lemon chicken and French bread. We had dinner in Italy, alfredo, an Italian salad, and some herbed bread. Then we were off to Spain for some Spanish games! Lori made the brochure, which she presented to Jeffree that morning.

It was a fun, all-day date. Here's a professional photograph of us playing our Spanish game.

We were exhausted at the end of the day, but it was fun :) Most of all, we were with each other, knowing that wherever we are, as long as we're together, it will be the most beautiful place in the world!