Dining Table

For Christmas, Marcs Parents got us a gift card to Ikea. We have been needing a dining room table really bad, we sold our last one to my cousin before moving out here and our card table wasn't cutting it any more! Marc wasn't too excited to make the trip and he wanted me to get a table I liked so he stayed home while my mom, sister and I went. We enjoyed a delicious lunch before hunting for the perfect table.

There was a big sale going on that day, unfortunately, the table I picked was not on sale. It has a leaf that pops up from the middle, that makes for a HEAVY table. Luckily there was a nice man at the store that took care of loading it for us! The box was a giant octagon, and super heavy. Marc and I had to lay it on the railing and slide it up the stairs, I was so scared it was going to fall over the edge! It made it, and it was pretty easy to put together, so were the chairs! Here are a few pictures, they aren't great, but tell me what you think! Ignore the pile in the corner, we are still trying to figure out where to put things!

Christmas and New Years!

I have some time off from work so I can finally get caught up on our Holiday adventures! We had all our presents under the tree the week of Christmas. Marc and I both can admit to peeking at our presents growing up, so we have to find really good hiding spots and both make an effort to not even touch our presents or we will start speculating. We were doing so good until Christmas Eve when I wasn't looking and slid on one of my presents. Mar freaked out wanting to make sure it wasn't broken. I felt the top of the box and it all seemed fine. Then my mind started working and I began guessing. He never would tell me, but I did get it right! We spent Christmas Eve being lazy and hanging around the house since work had been crazy the week leading up to it. We woke up and made homemade cinnamon rolls. We got a little creative, we used our flour mill and had whole wheat cinnamon rolls. One batch we added macadamia nuts and carmel! YUM! We made a trip to the store for Egg Nog, and that turned out to be a mistake! We got home and made homemade tomato soup for dinner, we had Martinellis Cranberry Apple Cider to go with it and watched Christmas story. We had fun making food and spending the day together. I was so excited I wanted to go to sleep so I could wake up the next day! When we went to bed I had a hard time falling asleep and ended up waking up and waking Marc up at 7:30.

The night before we took turns filling each others stockings. Part of Marcs went on the tree, so he filled mine then hid it under a blanket. I filled his and did the same. When we woke up we came into our living room and peeked at our stockings. Then it was present time! We took turns picking the present the other had to open. I had to wait for the last one that I had guessed and open it last, and I was right! Marc got me some pretty sweet Converse All Stars! He also picked out some great clothes for me! He loved all his presents too! I was really excited that he even liked all his stocking stuff! After cleaning up we headed over to his parents house. We ate pillsbury turnovers, a Chase Christmas Morning Tradition, and opened presents! His parents gave us, among other things, a gift card to Ikea to buy a dining table. I will post pictures soon! After opening presents we played wii and spent time together until dinner. His parents made a delicious Beef Burgeon! After dinner we headed to my parents. They had been in Colorado and got home early Christmas morning. We opened presents with them, we got Sonicare Electric Toothbrushes, talk about dentist clean! We had been wanting them for awhile and were grateful to get them! Thanks mom and dad! After that, we headed out to Chandler to visit my grandma and cousins there. We opened more presents and snacked on lots of goodies. When we finally got home around 11 we were beat!

We both worked the next week and didn't really get to celebrate our 2 year anniversary, hopefully we will before our 3rd! We had to work New Years Eve but got home around 5:30. We changed then headed over to my parents. They had a huge party and invited a bunch of people from their ward. The party stared at 4 but we got there at 6 and there were cars lining the street! My mom made BBQ pulled pork, my dad smoked a turkey, and someone BBQ'd Brisket. It was DELICIOUS! There were so many people there and I didn't know most of them, but it was so fun! My Aunt and Uncle were visiting from San Francisco so we spent time with them and their kids. We were so full. We spent the rest of the evening with my family. It was a crazy night too and we were so glad to come home and sleep!

On New Years day we went to Marcs parents for a feast. They made a ton of food and had everyone over. We love spending so much time with our families and having a little vacation time here and there! We hope you all had a great Holiday too!

Christmas Crafts and Such...

I know I have been a total blog slacker the last little while, but with good reasoning! I have been working like crazy and so has Marc. So, here is the update and some pictures to prove we are alive and well!

Marc and I really wanted to see the Christmas lights at the Mesa Temple before things got too busy. We went a few weeks ago with his brother Ben, his wife Danielle, and their son Tyler. We had so much fun! It was pretty busy, but it was fun to walk around and be reminded of the true meaning of Christmas. We didn't get a picture of us together, but here are the ones we got!



When Marc and I first started dating up at school before his mission, he told me he wasn't really a fan of christmas, more the commercialization of it, but he doesn't even get excited for it. Well, before we got married, I made it a goal to change that, now that it is our 3rd Christmas together, I think I am finally cracking the surface! I made a big deal about making Christmas cookies for the Chase family christmas party, and I actually put up decorations in our house, I never did since we weren't home to enjoy them. I really wanted to make our stockings since they can be really expensive to buy. I wanted to knit them, but couldn't find a knitting pattern. I ended up making them very similar to the way my mom made all of ours years ago, this is how they turned out, what do you think? I owe my sister in law Whitney a HUGE thanks for letting me use her sewing machine and making sure I knew what I was doing!

I am planning on going back and getting more of this fabric after christmas to make a matching tree skirt for next year! All of this got me really excited to decorate. Marcs brother Ryan and his wife Whitney let us borrow one of their fake trees that they aren't using this year, and we really didn't have ornaments. So, I made some! It cost me about $5 to make all 35 ornaments, and I think they turned out pretty cute! Here are pictures before they made it to the tree!


I am pretty happy with them, and they look really good on the tree, just take a look for yourself!

No, the printer is not a gift, we just need to put it on the desk. Anyway, I have done all of this in hopes of helping my wonderful husband like Christmas just a little and the other day he tells me he is "SO EXCITED"! I think I have begun to get through to him! I even started a little tradition for ourselves, this morning after we got up I made homemade cinnamon rolls! What made them even better is that I used my wheat mill and made Whole Wheat cinnamon rolls, and let me tell you, they are AMAZING! We also made one batch that had macadamia nuts and carmel in them, delicious! We decided that we will make them every Christmas Eve! We plan on taking the rest of the day easy and enjoying this quiet day alone, tomorrow will be a crazy one! We hope you all enjoy the day! Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving and a Little Update!

I promise we are alive and well! We have been super busy. I have been working as a part time temporary artist for Marcs dad's company for the last little bit, but it is slow time now so I have this week off. I have been putting in about 50+ hours a week, hence the lack of blogging! So, here we go!

Thanksgiving was great! There was a bit of miscommunication in our Thanksgiving plans, so we ended up eating Dinner with Marcs family, and went for dessert with my family. There was SO much food! We were in charge of sweet potatoes and rolls and somehow we managed to mess them both up! The roll recipe was one my mom uses, it is the same bread they bring you at outback. You are supposed to use bread flour. I didn't have any and looked like crazy online, everything said it was ok to use all purpose flour, well, not if half of the flour is wheat flour! I have a wheat grinder and made my own, lets just say we ended up with very dense rolls. We stopped by the store on the way to pick up a few more just in case. As for the sweet potatoes, while I was working on the rolls Marc took care of them. We boiled, peeled, and cut them the night before, so I had marc make the marinade. The recipe is one his mom hand wrote when she was about 16, it took me a bit but I was able to decipher it. Marc on the other hand had a little bit of a hard time. I went to give it a stir and realized the sugar was really grainy. Our brown sugar got really hard when we moved, but I was able to get it soft again so I didn't know why it wouldn't dissolve. When I asked Marc he said he put in white sugar, well we needed brown. So we added that, then balanced it out with more orange juice. They were VERY orangey! We put them in the oven the put a few marshmallows on them, we decided to finish baking them at his parents. The pan was too hot to put the lid on, so we set them very level and steady in the back, not luck, when we took them out the marinade and warm marshmallow goo showed us how tricky it was and spilled all over the back! They still tasted wonderful, and the car smelled festive too!

After eating and playing boche ball we went to my parents to eat dessert! Let me first say, my mom is AMAZING! There were about 4 or 5 homemade pies! Lets start the list, Apple, Pumpkin, Chocolate Cream, White Chocolate Blueberry, and I know I am forgetting one...anyway, they were WONDERFUL! We spent a little bit over there and then came home. We both had to be at work the next day and were really full and tired. It didn't help that it got to 80 degrees that day, then cool off really quick! But can you explain to me how Thanksgiving was 80 then two days later it was 60?! Gotta love AZ!

Our apartment is coming along wonderfully. We have had some not so good things, but we got a great deal and are only locked in for a 12 month lease, so we know we can make it! We have almost everything unpacked. This apartment is bigger than our last one but a couple hundred feet, but has SO much less storage, I have a box of food in my dining area! We have a few ideas on things to do to organize a bit, but we may have to wait until the holidays! I promise I will get some pictures of our place up! We need to decorate for Christmas too, so maybe we will have two in one pictures!

This weekend is going to be super busy! Hopefully I will get some pictures of that too! We have our nieces 1st birthday, and the Chase Family Christmas party with Marcs extended family. We will be baking lots of yummy cookies this week, I can't wait for it to smell like the holidays! I am also making our Christmas Stockings, once I finish them I will have to post a picture! And, I promise we will be more fun!

My little brother is turning 21 tomorrow! He is in Madagascar on his mission and should be coming home in February or March. I slacked on getting him out a birthday and Christmas package, but since it takes 2 months didn't think there was time. We too this picture on our computer, but it reflects the image, so we wrote backwards. Here is proof too that we are alive and well!


Also, if you are in Phoenix and want an AMAZING FREE haircut let me know! I found a coupon for a free shampoo, cut, and style at a new Paul Mitchell Salon in Scottsdale. My sister in law and I went the other day, and I want to go again, I just can't justify spending $45! They gave me coupons for a free cut to give away, and for every 3 people I refer I get another free cut! The lather lounge is a dark room with soft music playing and a tv playing the aquarium thing, the chairs have back massagers in them and they give you a wonderful hand and arm massage while washing your hair! I had water with cucumber brought to me too! The guy that did my hair was awesome! If you want a great stylist, I highly recommend him! Let me know if you want to try it out! Check back soon for more fun stuff!

I Know, It's Been Awhile!

I feel like such a slacker, but I have good reasons! I started doing some work for the company Marc's parents work for, they need help during the holidays, and we moved into our own apartment 2 weeks ago. Between unpacking and working around 50 hours a week, I haven't had blogging time, but the unpacking is done, and I don't need to work for a little while since it is a slow week. Once we get our place decorated and feeling like home I will post pictures. We are alive and well and have not fallen off the face of the earth!

A Weekend of Wedding!

This last Saturday my cousin Katie got married, in Salt Lake. I drove up with my mom, dad, sister and brother on Thursday. We stopped for the night in Page Arizona and I woke up to this wonderful view of Lake Powell!

We spent most of Friday driving. When we got in, we went to dinner with my cousin, her soon to be hubby, her dad and his wife, my aunt, my wonderful cousin Becky, and my aunt and uncle from Oregon. We went to a restaurant in Trolly Square called Rodizio. It is a Brazilian grill, and very delicious! It is also VERY expensive. When you get there you go to the salad bar. This salad bar had very limited green salad items, it is mostly premade salads, but they were all very tasty. While you sit and eat your plate of many salads they bring out all kinds of meat, marinated chicken, steak, porks, even chicken heart! They bring it out still on the giant kabob sticks they grill it on. Then they slice it with GIANT knives inches from your face! I was so full I just wanted to sleep! My parents decided to take a little trip to Temple Square, I am so glad we did! It was already a little after 6, so most things were closing down, but we still had fun walking around! Here are some pictures of us outside the Salt Lake Temple!


When I was younger my family lived in West Valley City. Our Regional Conference was held in the Tabernacle and Elder Monson, now President Monson, was the visiting General Authority. I don't remember that day, but I don't think I have been in the Tabernacle since then. My mom and I decided to peek in the windows and there were people in there doing tours! So in we went! While we were looking around a lady went to the front to demonstrate the acoustics of the building. I am pretty sure I take technology for granted because sitting in there I realized that Brigham Young didn't use a microphone! It was so amazing to hear her tear paper and drop pins and I was in the back! Those early pioneers were truly inspired by the Lord! Here are a few pictures in the Tabernacle!



We then got to take a tour of the Conference Center. Just one week prior to our visit, they were preparing for General Conference and the spirit was still strong! I have been to the Conference Center once before, but it was set up for the Choir I was so sad that I didn't get to see the pulpit. This time though, it was still set up from conference. It was amazing how strong the spirit was still! Here are a few pictures of the Conference Center, for journaling purposes!


There is this really cool statue sitting on a table in the entry way, I took a picture mostly to show Marc, but thought I would post it too! It is all carved out of one piece of wood! No paint , stain, or anything! This artist is amazing! What do you think?

This next picture is of one of our family's favorite pictures, it is kind of hard to see, but I am sure you recognize it! It is usually cut off when it is cropped to be small, but here is the full picture. Before it was hung in the Conference Center it was on display at the World's Fair, then rolled up and put in storage for 40 years before displaying it in the Conference Center!

The next day was the wedding. We all, well, the bride's family, were at the reception hall before the sun was up to decorate and set up for the reception. I won't out pictures of that up, none of us got ready, it was pretty scary! We all went out to breakfast after. My aunt, the mother of the bride, is a bawl baby and started crying then. We sent her home to get a little nap before heading off to the temple! Kaite and Bo were sealed in the Oquirrh Mountain Temple. The Temple is SO pretty and the ceremony matched the happy couple! Here are a few pictures of us outside the temple, and the happy couple after coming out of the Temple.


After the reception my family decided to take a trip up to the Draper Temple since we could see it glowing in the night. Here is a picture of my wonderful parents outside the Draper Temple.

Finally our weekend came to a close. Here is how the car trip went pretty much the whole way, I read (two books to be exact), and my brother and sister slept! We also decided we needed to get out and stretch a little, so we walked across the bridge above lake powell, and my dad drove the car across. Here we are before making the trek across the bridge!


It was a great weekend and we had fun spending time with our family. But it was nice to get back home to Marc and get ready to move into our own place!

The Hunt is On!

Marc and I have been looking at apartments online pretty much forever trying to decide where we want to live. We decided that we are ready to actually move into one but that is making things so much harder. Here is the story, Saturday was General Conference, not much time to get out look and come home to watch. I started stressing out because I am going out of town this weekend for a wedding. Marc doesn't get off until 5 and all places close at 6. We were going to look Thursday, but my travel planes were changed around, so now I am leaving Thursday afternoon. When were we going to be able to look together?

Monday Marc was talking to his manager and told her how crazy things have been. She was so nice and told him that if he would make up his hours Saturday, he could have the day off and we could go look. He came and picked me up, we went to lunch, then the hunt was on! We went to one that we saw online but hadn't been in. I think there might have been some incentive to get a lease because the lady talked to us for an hour and a half! We only looked at 2 floor plans! Then we went to one owned by the same company, but one we had looked at before, maybe I am strange, but I don't think I could used a washer and dryer older than me! Not to mention the one we would move into had laminate peeling off the counter! Definitely, crossed off our list! The next place I am not even kidding, I think the lady was a gypsy and read our minds as we walked through the door! She gave us the key and told us to check it out on our own. Let's just say I felt like I was walking through a maze. I was so confused! The washer/dryer was stacked and I am pretty sure could only do one piece of clothing at a time, no thanks! Next place, SO pretty, I fell in love with the office the rest had to be great too right, we tell the lady what we want and she replies, well, we don't have any opening up until December, but we have one 15 minutes south of here, um too far. So she gave us the number of a guy that you hire to find the perfect place for you, no thanks I can do this, really I can! We went to a few more places, all of them tried to convince us that they were ending their specials this week and we needed to hurry to get a good deal! Oh please, don't try that on me! My husband is a salesman, he knows all your tricks! We went over to Marc's parents to relax and take a break. They are out of town but Ryan, Whitney, Stefan, and Teagan were there. We spent time chatting and eating and in the spa. We felt a lot better about things. Then when we got home I looked up a few more apartments and found one that I fell in love with! Marc went and looked at them since he was meeting with a client close by, he liked them too. So we are going tonight before they close! Wish us luck!