BD's only come once a year...

There is only one person on this planet who is perfect for me. Now, thinking eternally here, we all individually have a lot to learn right? And apparently I have a lot to learn about myself because no other person has taught me more about myself then my husband. He knows all of me, the good's, the bad's and the in-between's.
We are a 2 pea's in a pod. He is my opposite in sooo many ways. But oddly enough exactly like me in quite a few ways. Together we make one complete union and I never quite understood the possibility of that. I'm so thankful that we are together, and today I celebrate him.

A couple month's ago Hillary posted this cake that she made. A Key Lime cake. I immediately thought ewww gross...but my immediate next thought was CORY WOULD LOVE THAT CAKE! (I told you we are opposites in many ways)
So I emailed her for the recipe and saved it to make it until today. And of course he LOVED it :)


It was our anniversary (11 yr Yahoo!) on May 14th. That weekend Cory whisked me away to the Grand America downtown SLC. We started the evening off, eating at the Roof which over looks the Salt Lake Temple. We then went to the Grand America, and had a couples massage. The rooms were beautiful with marble everywhere. I felt quite spoiled. This was outside our room on the balcony.



This was last weekend. We went up to Wyoming to run in the Keith Young 5k. (Keith Young is my uncle who passed away of SADS (www.sads.org) There were close to 550 people who competed and Cory got 3rd place out of his age division, and I got 1st place out of my age division and finished the 2nd girl. We love to compete! (We are the same in this area haha)


Cory LOVES the sand dunes. He loves to ride, and is good at it. He is a thrill seeker, and is working on catching air on this thing. Yikes. I like riding 4-wheelers, but I am a water-lover. And I'm still looking forward to family vacations at Powell :)


He is a handyman/painter/finisher/repairer of anything/fixer/etc. Our past 2 homes were fixer uppers and together we have knocked down walls, installed flooring, tile, crown molding, chair railing, built bookshelves, re-sanded hardwood floors, landscaping, cut down tree's (still gives me chills), painted a gagillion times and the list goes on. But we do it together and most of the projects go quite smoothly.


He is a family man. He cares about his kids and would do anything for them. He loves them so much and it showes everytime he walks into the room and the kids scream DADDY! He works from home earning less then he probably would in the "real" world so that he can be home and eat lunch with us, and be with us afterschool. He understands and was taught well about what having a "family" means. I am so grateful for that, and I love his mom and dad so much for being amazing examples to him. They came over to have cake with us. Love you guys!



Happy Birthday to the one I love :)
Loves,
Jill

Bike refurbishing...

Bensen is not very interested in riding a bike. He has a different 4-wheel bike that he is 100% happy riding and has no interest in switching. So naturally I had to get creative and figure out a way to get him on a 2-wheel bike. So I came up with a great idea! I told him we would paint it GREEN! Green is his absolute favorite color. Anything that is green he will eat, or play with it, or wear it etc. So I presented the idea to him, and he LOVED it! So here is the before picture of the bike...

Taking apart the bike was not so easy, but once that finally happened it was on to priming...

Then painting...

I thought taking the bike apart was hard, well getting the new handle bar grip things on there was no easy task either. Thank goodness I had Cory around.

Ta Da!! He loved it! It was great to see him hop right on the bike and want to ride it. He had a big smile and was way excited!

He immediately set a goal to ride to the mailbox and back...

This project took me about a month with the weather being so crazy lately. But its all done now and Bensen is ready to transition to the 2-wheeler!! Just in time for warm-weather :) Loves, Jill

The search.

Just a fore-warning...this may not be such a happy post.

Ever have a week (or weeks) when you are searching for happiness? Even with the lovely world around me, I've had a couple of weeks like this. It's absurd really, due to my lovely circumstances and amazing life that I have, but yet I still have been on the search lately. Which tells me that I need to do some more searching. Or fixing. I have felt a lack of LOVE in my life. Which again tells me I have not been giving enough LOVE. So with my renewed attitude and some courage that I found I need to make some changes. Nothing major of course, just a couple intrinsic, positive, adjustments.

Because with all of this, how could I not be happy?



















Loves,
Jill

Pic's of Laundry and...Wordle

Well, My laundry room is so close. All's that is left is final decorating touches. But here is the advancement thus far.

Pre-Laundry room (November 2009)
That ugly shelf was the only storage I had for all that junk. No Good!






Now... the
newly
painted
and
very organized!

Ta Da!


Tall cabinents that hold my vacuums and cleaning supplies etc.


My sewing and crafting countertop.


I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE IKEA! That's where I found this fabulous fold away clothes dryer. And all my cabinents.


Never can have to much storage...and yes I have used every drawer and cabinet in here! This is also a great place for me to fold all the millions of clothes that I have to fold every week...which I do with love of course.



I need every inch of space in this room, so the space behind the door I hung these Peg Rack's and they come in so handy especially to hang Lily's dresses, and my workout clothes that cannot go in the dryer.


This was another storage item that I had, that I do not need anymore...Any takers? Whoever calls it first gets it! It has four drawers, that I used for ribbons, thread, buttons etc.


And that wraps up the room so far. Now on to the final touches...if you have any great stylish idea's for dealing with my wrapping paper, and/or fun things that I can put on the walls to make it more vintage and countryish, I'll take all the idea's I can get :)

One more thing...I came across this website today www.wordle.net
I collected some of my single word thoughts for today and this is what I easily created...
(I can't make it any bigger)

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Happy Easter.
Loves,
Jill

Finally...A snowGIRL! And project almost complete

We had a pretty big storm over this past weekend. On Friday morning we woke up to 1 ft of snow on the ground. And even though Spring is right around the corner, I was sooo happy to dress Lily and Bensen, once again, in their snow clothes and go play in all the fresh snow. But this time it was all about making my kind of "snow..girl"!
Lily and I even brought out the make-up. And of course the finishing touch...her own little purse that I made for Lily awhile ago out of some old jeans that I wore completly out!
She was quite proud of our creation, and spent about 10 minutes nestled right up to her!!


Bensen on the other had, had no interest in our "snow-girl" and was way happier throwing snow all over the place with his shovel. Seriously the difference between boys and girls is as different as night and day...I love it, naturally but I am soooo happy to have a little girl that will put make-up on a snowGirl with me!

And I am almost complete with my Laundry room renovation SIGH! I have been working on it since Novemeber, so I can't wait to get the finishing pieces into place. I will be posting pictures soon. I painted my kitchen in December and I have a master plan for that area as well, but Whoa Nelly that will take me some time. But maybe for fun I will post the updates and share all my wild ideas...
Loves,
Jill

Sundance!

The boys and I have gone up to Sundance a few times in the last couple weeks. It is great since the Bunny Hill is free and it is a great, little (yes, little) hill to learn on.

Bensen's first time skiing was this year. He picked it up really fast too! I even think he enjoyed himself most of the time. Asher remembered quickly, and then I remembered how he ski's...like a bat out of! I remembered quickly that he doesn't care so much about turning. He just wants to go straight down and pass people as he does it. ( I totally get that).

Sking btw is a great workout, but teaching little kids to ski has to bump up the calorie expenditure by 200 calories. It's not easy carrying a kid and holding on to the rope-tow at the same time...

Bensen skied on these ski's...



This is not as easy as it looks



Soo much fun :)



Oh and just to make it clear....yes we are a snowboarding family. But for some reason Cory INSISTS that the boys learn to ski first. I honestly don't understand it, but since I love him I am going along with it. But next year we will BOARD!!! :)

Loves,
Jill

Noodles...

Thank goodness for "noodles."

Loves,
Jill