Best day ever

Today is our 3 year anniversary. I can’t believe it. I will keep this short and sweet, but basically I’m the luckiest girl ever.I found someone who loves me for me but makes me want to be better. I found someone who will put up with me, support me, and love me forever!

Dan is my very best friend and I can’t imagine my life without him. Sometimes I forget what my life was like before him and I can’t wait for life we have ahead of us. He brings me so much happiness and joy and I hope that others can be blessed to have a small taste of the joy that we have together.

He is kind, caring, hilarious, hard working and everything I could want and more. He will make an amazing father to our children. What would I do without him? I literally think my heart would stop beating if I didn’t have him…I don’t want to find out. I’m the happiest girl in the world and I couldn’t imagine spending eternity with anyone else.

And speaking of hard working, Dan started his new job this week with US Magnesium and so far he is loving it! He is on the sales team and works as a client/account manager and helps with orders and stuff. He is a busy boy and goes to work early (he even has his own office! Lucky!) and stays late, then goes to class and does homework at night. What a man! I definitely miss having him around as much, but this job is such a blessing for us and we are grateful for the opportunities it will give Dan. My job is still going well and I’m enjoying it (most days…). We have a lot of fun plans for the summer and the Wasatch Back race is coming up in a month! Eek!

East Coast Chapter 3

Sorry it has taken awhile to get these posted, but here is the last of our pictures from our trip to CT and NYC. After spending the day in the city on Saturday, we came back to Shelley’s house (luckily Shell was just about over her sickness). We had fun dying Easter eggs and even though he wanted to take over, Thad had fun too!

I’m holding the cute dog they were taking care of (Jade). That was OBSESSED with her and just followed her around everywhere and sat on the ground staring at her. He was so soft with her and told her everything and showed her his toys. He was so cute and would say every few minutes “Where did Jade go?” and he would go around looking for her. He is such a cutie pie!

On Easter Sunday morning, we got up and Brian read about the Resurrection in the Bible. Then we hunted for our Easter baskets! Shelley was so nice to get baskets for Dan and I with our favorite treats. She hid them really well too. I didn’t grow up with the tradition of hiding baskets so it was really fun to search the house for them and help Thad look for his.

Our baskets with treats (Dan got pepsi, pringles, chapstick, gum and candy and I got Diet Coke, a fridge grocery list, and candy). Shelley also made these AMAZING cake balls that tasted exactly like my favorite Easter Basket Cakes/Christmas Tree Cakes.

Thad found his basket and couldn’t stop staring at “Tangles”. That is what he calls the movie “Tangled”. He loved it and also loved his dinosaur books that he got. He LOVES dinosaurs and can say so many of the hard names perfectly!

Looking at his dinosaur book and showing me a bouncy ball he got in his basket.

Sunday was a gorgeous day and we took a few pictures before we left for church. It was a little too bright for Thad to look at the camera, but he kept saying “Cheese!”

We had a delicious Easter dinner and Shelley’s friend Hannah came over (her husband and little girl were out of town). We had lots of fun and dinner was yummy. We visited and hung out then later that night, Dan and I packed up and took the train into the city to stay at a hotel for our last night.

I mentioned awhile ago that I used Priceline “Name your own price” and got a great deal on a hotel, and it didn’t disappoint! It was a 5 minute walk from the train station and the hotel was AWESOME! It was really old and opened in 1902 and has been designated as a NYC Historic Landmark. It had a neat vibe and it was a great place to stay.

In June 1919 the hotel became the site of the daily meetings of the Algonquin Round Table, a group of journalists, authors, publicists and actors who gathered to exchange bon mots over lunch in the main dining room. The group met almost daily for the better part of ten years. Harry Connick Jr. and other famous musicians also launched their careers here.

Here is our room. It was tiny, but really nice and had a big TV. The bed was waaaay comfortable and we’re glad we got to spend the night there.

The next day, we were able to leave our luggage at the hotel, and we met Shelley and Thad at the train station. I’m really glad they got to spend the day with us, and we had a ton of fun. It was really warm and humid, but Thad was a champ and Dan helped a ton while we maneuvered strollers and got on the subway! Here we are at Grand Central Station.

We went to the Brooklyn Bridge and walked about halfway across it. It was pretty cool to look back and see the huge buildings in Manhattan.

Afterwards, we walked to Chinatown and Dan took Thad to a park and entertained him for over an hour while Shelley and I shopped our hearts out! He is such a sweetie and so good with kids. Shell and I had a blast and got some good loot and Thad loved his life. When we got back, his little cheeks were super rosy and he was way hot. Dan said he didn’t stop playing and running around the entire time!

We had such a great time visiting the Monsens and they are the best hosts ever. Shell is such a great friend and mother and I’m so lucky to have a girl like her in my life!

Holy awesome

I still have one more round of NYC/CT pics to post, but I have two exciting things to mention, so I wanted to do that first!

First of all, my youngest brother in law got his mission call yesterday, and he’s going to the Bulgaria Sofia mission! Isn’t that AWESOME?! He doesn’t leave until October (longest wait ever) and he will be speaking Bulgarian. I believe the mission also includes Serbia but he probably won’t be going there.

Just in Dan’s immediate family, between his dad, brothers, sister, and in-laws, they have served in the following countries:

• Ireland
• Singapore
• Russia
• France
• Japan
• Phillipines
• Canada
• Brazil
• Australia

Isn’t that amazing? We are so excited for him and I can’t believe that out of 8 kids (6 boys, 2 girls), 7 kids will have served missions in Dan’s family. Pretty sweet.

My second bit of exciting news is that Dan got a new job!!! This is so awesome and exciting for us and everything just worked out so perfectly that we know it was meant to be. He has been working on campus at Weber State and he will finish his Bachelor’s degree this summer, then start his MBA in the fall through Utah State (classes are in Layton). His MBA classes are only 2 days a week in the evening so he was planning on getting a full time job towards the end of summer.

Last week, he applied for 3 jobs on Wednesday night and Thursday morning, one called, then he had an interview on Friday, another interview on Monday, and he was offered the job on Monday! Crazy fast. He will be working at US Magnesium as some sort of Account/Client Management. He is excited for something new, but nervous because change can be scary, and he will be really busy with school and work. But his job will work around the one class he has Tues/Thurs mornings until June, and his schedule is from 7-3:30 so he will be done with work every day in time for his MBA classes which start in the Fall! Another bit of awesomeness is that he will only be about 5-7 minutes away from my work, so we can carpool together! I get freakishly tired ALL THE TIME (even when I regularly go to bed between 9 and 10) and I HATE driving to work because I get so sleepy. So now we can carpool together and I can snooze in the car and we will save lots of moolah on gas. Sweetness.

The job also has really great medical benefits and the employees pay nothing out of pocket which is pretty amazing. My company has great benefits but we still have to pay a decent amount each month, so if we switch to his company, we can save that money. We will now also be able to pay cash for his Master’s degree which is something we didn’t know if we would be able to do. I’m really pumped about this opportunity for Dan and for us and I know it’s a great blessing. Dan works so hard and I’m so proud of him and all he does.

Final NYC/CT pictures coming soon.

East coast part 2

 

Dan and I went to the Top of the Rock (Rockefeller Building) and it was awesome! We loved it and we could see downtown NYC on one side and Central Park on the other. I don’t think it’s quite as high as the Empire State Building, but we didn’t have to wait at all and the views were amazing. I highly recommend it.

Central Park behind us.

After Top of the Rock, we got on the train and went back to Shelley and Brian’s. We got back in time for a yummy dinner, ice cream and a movie.

On our second day in the city (Saturday), we were going to go with Shelley, Brian and Thad. But we woke up Saturday and Shelley had been really sick all night and was still sick! It was awful and I was selfishly sad because I wanted to hang out with her! But luckily she got better during the day and no one else got sick either. So Dan and I took the train again into the city and it wasn’t cold, but it was pouring rain!

We took the subway to Chinatown and did some browsing along Canal Street. There wasn’t a lot of people because of the rain but we didn’t mind it. We didn’t buy anything until later so we wouldn’t have to carry it around with us all day. We ate lunch at a tiny restaurant in Chinatown because Dan wanted to eat duck. Weird but he did and later regretted it…my lunch was good though and we ventured back into the rain and walked down to Battery Park, Ground Zero, and saw Wall Street.

We checked out the Statue of Liberty from the benches in Battery Park, but the weather wasn’t so great so we decided against taking the boat to see it. Dan talked to some shady characters selling fake Rolex watches, but they weren’t cheap enough for him so we didn’t buy any.

We walked back to Canal Street and it was packed because the rain cleared up and it was Easter weekend. I loaded up on cute purses (for myself and a few others), scarves, etc. All Dan got was a shot glass, poor kid. He just doesn’t like to spend money so I spent it for him! Woo hoo! We were going to try to get tickets to a Broadway show, but it just didn’t work out this time (I’m sure I’ll go back to visit soon), so we didn’t see a show. There were TONS of people in Times Square and everywhere while we walked back to the train.

We ate a yummy dinner at a restaurant in Grand Central station and caught the train back to Shelley’s house. We got on the train really early, so we had a little fun with the camera.

We also got some cupcakes from Magnolia’s Bakery in Grand Central and they were delish!

Back East Part 1

 

We are back from our awesome trip to Connecticut and New York. We had a great time visiting the Monsen’s and enjoying New York City. I’m breaking this post up into a few posts since I have a lot of pictures and if you don’t like reading what we did each day, then skip to the pictures!

We took a red eye flight and got to JFK at 6am and Brian picked us up and we went to their house and visited for awhile then we took a nap for a few hours. We picked up Brian from work and went to lunch at Stew Leonard’s. It was a really neat store that was huge and had tons of different food and groceries (I bought some shrimp and scallops!)

Thad was terrified of this big fake cow that kept mooing and it was pretty funny. We ate fish and chips and burgers then went back to their house to hang out and play with Thad. Brian got home and we went to eat at a place called Jordan’s where we had Greek pizza and a delicious salad!

The next day we took the train into NYC (it was about 1 hour). Of course I slept the entire way there! As we started walking, we came across H&M! I love this place and we had to walk around even though I didn’t buy anything. I shopped here when I lived in Holland and they had H&M all over Europe. They are building one at Fashion Place Mall soon yay!

We walked a TON and even though it was sunny, it was freezing! The wind was blowing and we were all bundled up but we still enjoyed the city. We walked through Times Square and took a few pics.

We walked all the way to the Met and Dan agreed to come even though museums are definitely not his thing. We only spent a few hours there, but I enjoyed it.

Above: On the steps of the Met. Below; A sweet piece of art which totally distorted our vision and seriously made me sick to look at!

After the Met, we walked through Central Park and enjoyed the gorgeous Spring blossoms (even though it didn’t feel like Spring). Below: The Plaza Hotel with tulips outside.

We stopped at the Dakota Building where John Lennon was shot. Last time I was here in high school, we saw Yoko Ohno outside here!

The Park was really pretty and it’s so BIG!

After Central Park, we took a cab to Rockefeller Plaza. It was so worth the cab fare because it would have taken forever to get there and my feet were killing me! They had all this cute Easter stuff and flowers at Rockefeller Plaza.

We bought tickets to go to the Top of the Rock and went to get some pizza before we went up. We just ate at a random small place but it was yummy!

More to come soon….