Olsen Family

Holidays at the Olsen House

2012-02-06T11:05:00.002-07:00

Holidays are always fun but this year was even better! My parents came out for Thanksgiving and Christmas this year so that made it even more fun! Thanksgiving we have always had a tradition with the Hansen side to go bowling in the morning, have Thanksgiving dinner, and then finish off the night with a movie. I love spending time with my mom's side of the family, I have the best cousins, aunts and uncles and of course my grandparents. Its always a bonus that Austin gets along with them great as well, he fits right in. This year we were in charge of bringing our amazing sweet potatoes that a family in Texas used to make (they are always a huge hit!) regular mashed potatoes and a salad. While skinning the potatoes I asked Austin if our disposal could handle the potato peels and he said "oh yeah" as my mom is sitting there saying "um I don't know". So I go with my husband, lets just say that was a bad bad idea!!!! It clogged our disposal and he and my dad spent lots of timing fixing it. While I had to figure out how to clean my kitchen and finish making all the food. Which if you know me I can't stand a messy kitchen, let alone to leave it messy. My mom helped me clean it up as best we could with using our outside hose to clean the dishes off so at least no food was left to sit in it. Yes, I know I have a problem :)

After this wonderful experience, we headed over to my Aunt and Uncles and enjoyed our Thanksgiving dinner and movie. I had the bright idea to go to Walmart at midnight because I had never been.... lets just say I wont do that again. haha But my mom and I did wake up early and go do some early morning black Friday shopping. We then met up with my dad, Austin, and headed to the mall. Kelsi and Simon met up with us there as well. It was a great day and I am very grateful they all came out!!!

Christmas Eve we have a tradition of going over the my Grandparents house on the Hansen side. We do a dinner, little program and open presents. Like I said I love hanging out with the Hansen side so it was a perfect Christmas Eve!

Christmas was very different this year, I have never had so many presents under my tree before! We had EVERYONE's presents under the tree and even on the other side of our entertainment center! My sister had a bright idea to buy a snake... yes you heard me a snake!! My dad is terrified of snakes and so they told him they had to go to Park City to pick up a purse for me for Christmas. Little did he know he was walking into a house where a guy raises snakes! UGH. So Christmas morning my sister brings Lucy (the snake over), I had a hard time with this but she was good and kept it away from me and by the end of the morning I touched her. :)

We woke up Christmas morning and had our traditional Swedish pancakes and then opened presents! It was a great morning. We then got ready and headed to the Westberg Family. I forget how big this family is getting! Or the house is getting smaller? who knows haha But they are always so fun to be around, everyone is always laughing and making fun of each other (in a good way). The Westberg side is very sarcastic... that's probably where I get my sarcastic side. :) I am very lucky to have the family that I do!

After the Westberg family we headed over to Austins mom's house to play games and have dinner. Christmas was different this year, I felt like we had Christmas for like 4 days haha. Ben (Austins step brother) is a pilot and wasn't going to be home until Monday and they wanted the boys to wait to open presents for when their dad was home. We couldn't make it over on Monday and when you come from a big family sometimes not everyone is there all at the same time! But it was great! instead of having Christmas just one day we got to have it 4, couldn't be any better than that.

LOVE the Holidays and I couldn't have asked for a better year for Holidays. I always have a hard time not being home for the Holidays and this year I got to stay home and have both families in one spot!

New Years Austin and I decided to go somewhere! So we went to St. George, haha, but honestly it was amazing! The weather was beautiful and warm! Plus I love St. George and would move there in a heart beat if we couldn't get to Texas soon :). This year has already started out great! First we have had warm weather, hardly any snow and I couldn't be more happy with that!

Salon has been great! We got new owners and they totally fixed the place up and I am so lucky to have a job so close to home! Austin has been busy busy busy! Tax season started up and he is finishing up school to graduate in May and so I am basically a single/widow lady until May 5th! (which is graduation day). He works 8-4 at Overstock, 415-8/9 doing taxes plus school on Tuesday nights oh and don't forget Young Men's. Then Sat he does Book-Keeping for a company in Park City. CRAZY CRAZY!! But I am very lucky to have such a hard working husband, I have had to tell him to calm down because he keeps trying to add more stuff on! He is amazing and I love him so so much!

Best news of all........ MAY 5TH IS GRADUATION AND THEN WE LEAVE ON A CRUISE TO GRAND CAYMAN ISLAND AND JAMAICA!!!!!!! May cannot come soon enough

MICE!

2011-12-01T13:46:00.000-07:00

I never realized how deathly afraid of mice I am until this last weekend! When people tell me "Oh we have mice!" I just thought THAT SUCKS! But now that we have them I have realized I HATE THEM! I will now have more sympathy for people that have them.

When we moved in almost 3 years ago to our townhouse I got on a quarterly pest control plan. After 2 1/2 years of doing it I thought "what good is this doing and costing me $70". Well now I know what good it was doing! 4 Months after stopping it we started finding spiders, little bugs, and now mice! We have had lots of construction going on and the weather has changed too so that hasn't helped. We also have had both neighbors move out and new move in, so I add that to the problem as well.

Monday night after doing laundry, I went to put the kitchen towels in the drawer in the kitchen. I open the drawer and find Coopers food in the drawer. At first I thought "Austin or my dad put this there to make me mad because I am so OCD clean". I yell for Austin and he swears he did do it..... I then lift the towels up to find droppings!! We then look through the 3 drawers above and find more droppings. At this point I am trying to not let my anxiety kick in and kept telling myself "calm down we can clean this up!" We check all the other cabinets, pantry, and sink. We find nothing! So we run to the store and buy traps. The next morning, we go to give Cooper a treat and find his treats under the sink EVERYWHERE! That night we go to the store and buy little poison pebbles and Wool to cover up the places he could be getting into. After doing ALL this, we deep cleaned our entire house and put all the food in tupperware!! And when I say deep clean its deep clean Ashlyn style.... poor Austin, but he was a good sport and didn't complain. (He has alittle OCD himself as he tells me when we are done he needs a shower because he feels gross after cleaning up mouse crap). In the middle of the night I wake up (its about 1:20 am) and had this awful feeling that there were mice running around my kitchen, an entire family! So I lean over to Austin and tell him "um hey, can you go check on the mice please?" I seriously have an amazing husband because he didn't even hesitate! (I think he is just used to my crazy ways and instead of questioning it he knows just to do it to calm me down haha). So we go downstairs and Austin opens the cupboards below the sink and there is GUS (we named him Gus). He was trying to get out and couldn't because we sealed all the holes up.... well at least we thought..... Austin watched him for about 5 min and then we found out where he came in at! There is a hole we forgot to cover that connects to the dishwasher and goes downstairs. We didn't seem him the rest of the night or even into the next day. This morning we wake up and Austin goes downstairs to check and Gus WAS BACK, he got into the little poison pebbles and they were EVERYWHERE under the sink. We are hoping that means he got them. I think there are more than one.... Austin thinks its just Gus so I named the other one Bob. :)

Needless to say I called the pest control people and they are coming out tomorrow morning to hopefully help us! I don't want them in my house, they need to stay away. Cooper is ZERO help in this matter too. Austin told me he thinks Cooper has be friend ed the little guy and is sharing his food and treats. He thinks they sit on the couch all day and snuggle. Which honestly I wouldn't be surprised if Cooper was watching Gus, Bob, and friends take his food. He isn't possessive over his food like some dogs, in fact when we babysit other friends dogs its always Cooper who waits his turn and lets the other dogs go first. haha I have raised a polite dog :) So cross your fingers everyone that we have stopped Gus, Bob and friends from coming to our house. This is a warning to EVERYONE in my complex........ We are having the pest people over so you might have mice. :)

We are Back!!

2011-11-15T14:14:00.027-07:00

After a year of not blogging I figured I should get back into it. We have had a crazy yet fun year. My sister got engaged in Feb., we as a family went to Vegas the day after they got engaged and spent some time there. We always have lots of fun with my family regardless of what we end up doing. My dad went crazy with the pictures as usual but it was fun! We went to the Hoover Dam where my mom and Austin were the biggest babies about haha. They both don't like hights so they stood way far back. We walked around the strip, went shopping and just enjoyed eachother company. Here are a few pictures from that trip. :)

This year was full of Triathlons as well. Austin did one in Riverton with the young men in the ward, he did Saratoga Springs, Yuba Lake, and Ogden. He talked me into doing one as well so I did one in Murry and LOVED it. So we can't wait for next summer so we can do more again. Here are some pictures from a few of them.....

Next we had my sisters wedding which was wonderful! She got married in the Salt Lake Temple and had a luncheon at the Lion House and then we went to Chicago and had a reception there. Here are a few pictures from her wedding. :)

Of course all summer we went boating and to Lake Powell! We went to Hoogle Zoo, Strut your Mutt for no more homeless pets, My cousin got married in St. George so we headed down there for that as well as went hiking, Austins brother Zack came home from his mission, demolitions derby with friends, we went up to the Canyons in the Fall, and of course BYU football games. More Pictures!!!

That is pretty much the basics of our year! I will be better about blogging this next year!!! :)

Black Cat

2010-11-11T19:16:00.003-07:00

I just realized I have not updated my blog sense our cruise! I come on here and read everyones cute blogs and forget to update my own!
A couple of nights ago we had a nice visiter.... a black cat! He/She has been wondering around for awhile now. It is so pretty and is so sweet.. BUT I CAN"T KEEP IT! He/She has been staying in our garage and leaves during the day then comes back at night. Its so cold here and can't imagine leaving it outside. This is where my tender heart and love comes with animals. I am on a mission to find the owner or find A owner for this little cat, but that will not be me. He/she has already hit Cooper a few times and thats where I draw the line :).If any of you have seen big bang theory you will understand this song..... Austin and I think of this song everytime we see this little cat...

Soft Kitty Warm Kitty
Little ball of fur
Warm Kitty Sleepy Kitty
PUR PUR PUR

Beautiful Bahamas

2010-06-07T12:59:00.014-06:00

Sad to say but we just got back from our trip with my family from the Bahamas. I must say I would buy a summer home there in a heartbeat. I have never seen such beautiful blue water in my life. I have been to Cancun and seen beautiful water but nothing like what I saw last week. Pictures don't do it justice! Our first day we headed to Key West, which is still in Florida but was still so pretty. The water was blue and the weather was hot and humid (just what I like).

Next stop was Nassau, Bahamas. This was such a fun Island, not what I expected at all but still so fun. Lots of history there of pirates and so of course Austin was in heaven. Property value there is SOOOOO high. To give you an example, our house we have would be classified as poverty. I guess people there make a lot of money and your classified as poverty if you make less than 100,000 a year. They don't have a high crime rate there either because they don't put up with crap basically. If you rape or touch a little kid in any way they hang you. They are not afraid to hang anyone if you do something the Bahamian government doesn't like. If you steal you get kicked off the Island. They basically take EVERYTHING very seriously. On the Island is where the hotel Atlantis is as well, this hotel was amazing! There is a room there that is 25,000 a night and the min stay is 4 nights. Everything is also made out of gold. CRAZY!! This hotel was crazy but beautiful.

Here is a picture of Hotel Atlantis, the middle part of the picture is the room that is 25,000 a night.

This picture is of a place they call "The Queens Staircase". Its where the people of the Bahamas would go when they were being attacked. They would go down this staircase to a door that would take them under ground to the other side of the Island... Keep in mind the Island is only 7 miles long total. :) But the slaves actually built this, it was insane how tall it was and it was sooo pretty.

Off to CocoCay, Bahamas. This I must say was my favorite stop. We got to spend a whole day on the beach and enjoy the beautiful weather and wonder water and sand. This is a little Island that Royal Caribbean (our cruise ship owns). It’s a private Island and only guest on the cruise ship are allowed on this Island. There is SOOO much to do too. The best part was wave running, it was so cool to see how blue the water was and just getting to wave run in the Bahamas is amazing. There is so much to see and appreciate for sure! There is an Island for sell to for 9 million.... trying to convince my dad to buy it haha.

Here is a picture of us on the beach

Picture of us Wave Running!

Every night, we got to go to a very formal dinner on the ship. It was so fun to get dressed up and be wined and dined for sure! Best part of a cruise is the food, you can't get enough. Also the pina coladas, they are my favorite!

Formal Dinner night

We also got the chance to go to Chicago for one day to see my sister graduate High school. It was so weird to see her graduate, she is too little to graduate! :) She actually heads out to start summer semester at BYU next week, now that is weird but I am very glad she will be out here. Which means she gets to spend more time with us and have Austin annoy her more then he already does, looks like she won’t be able to get away from my dad because Austin annoys her just as much as my dad. haha

Kelsi Graduating

There is just a little glimpse of our wonderful cruise we had with my family! I am so greatful for my family and how much fun we have with them. They are awesome and I wish they lived closer so we could have more memories with them. Thanks again mom and dad for the wonderful trip! We love you lots and I am so proud of my little sis who isn't so little anymore for graduating High School and going to BYU.

Cruise Time!

2010-05-24T13:44:00.006-06:00

We will be leaving on Friday for Chicago to see my sister graduate from High School, which is super super weird that she is old enough to start college! Then on Sunday we will be heading to Miami to catch our cruise to the Bahamas! We seriously are in need of a vacation. I think this is the longest we have gone without going somewhere... I know I know "poor us!" :). But we get to go with my family and they are so fun to be with so I am sure we will have lots of stories.

Goodbye Utah snowy weather to beautiful warm Bahama weather this weekend! Maybe that means my allergies will clear up too. haha

R.I.P. Dallas MAVS

2010-04-27T10:31:00.012-06:00

Well with the series being 3-1, Spurs ahead, I feel the need to express my deep depression of my teams lack of ability to beat them. Yes I know we still have a chance but the chance of us catching up is 4%, 4%!!!! Thats not enough hope, although I must say I still have hope that we can pull out the next 2 games to tie it up, and as for the 3rd game.... well I will leave that up to the MAVS.

Jason Kidd has done a great job and my hat goes off to you for being 37 and showing all these younger guys that even at an old age you can still be on top.

Jason Terry you are my hero on the 3 point shots! BUT man oh man when you are off you are off. But I do have to say I am a big fan of you and think you bring alot to the team!

I can't forget to talk about my new favorite player on the Mavs. BUTLER!! I have been impressed with him this year and hope he stays with us because he has been an awesome defensive player!

Last but not least Dirk! You are awesome, I love your over dramatic fouls and the one finger hair swipe! LOVE YOU :)

Although I have R.I.P Dallas Mavs, I will still have hope that you will pull through!!!

HAPPY 2 ANNIVERSARY TO US

2010-04-12T11:59:00.003-06:00

2 years ago from today I remember waking up in the morning, getting in the shower and thinking "I cannot believe this day is finally here!". I put my make-up on, with the help of my good friend Mallory and then off we went to get my hair done. For some reason I kept thinking in my head " he better show up!" :) Needless to say I was the one that was late but I did show up and he was there waiting for me. We have been through so many good times the past 2 years and I don't see why people say they are hard when you get married. I have never been so happy in my entire life as I am today. I am just as happy now, if not more, then I was the day we got married. I love that my family adores him and he adores them just the same. He is my best friend, I can’t imagine doing anything without him. As pathetic as it is, our lives are not as fun when each other is not around. I can’t imagine going on a trip without him, the most time we have spent away from each other was 5 days and we both said we will never do that again! J My parents are the best examples to me and if Austin and I can have a marriage like my parents then I would say we will have the best marriage. I often explain to people that they act like they just got married and have been married for 26 years. I see my dad a lot in Austin, in the sense that my dad would do ANYTHING for my mom and I have never questioned my dad’s love for my mom and I hope our kids will never questioned our love for eachother. My mom would always tell me “when you look for your future husband if you look at them and think my dad would never treat my mom like that, then you know he is not the one for you”. I have found the perfect man for me!!

He puts up with my crazy OCD habits, the fact that I don't like watching anything that has an animal getting hurt, killed, scared etc, my love for Cooper, he goes to musicals with me (haven’t gotten him to a ballet yet, but I’m sure he would go :) ), my complaining when I have a bad day, and making sure to give me a kiss every morning when he leaves for work and when he gets home from work/school.

My family means the world to me and it makes all the difference in the world to know that I married someone that fits perfectly, almost to perfectly in our family. Sometimes I think they love him more than me :)

I have the most wonderful life and the most wonderful husband to share my life with. He will be an amazing Father someday and I will be so blessed to have a husband who will cherish a little life just as much as I will. Who knows what the next year will bring us but I can say right now I am happy to be married to such a wonderful, loving, caring, humble man. HAPPY ANNIVERSARY BABE I LOVE YOU WITH ALL OF MY HEART!

SPRING COME SOON!!

2010-03-24T11:54:00.005-06:00

The weather here in Utah has been very frustrating the past couple of weeks. One day we have 60 degree weather and then the next its snowing and cold. I have decided that spring needs to come NOW! I love the winter but only in December and then after that I have had it. This is one reason I keep trying to convince Austin that we should move to Texas for the winters, although they havn't been getting any better weather then we have.

We are also such a married couple in the winter. We have our TV shows every night and look forward to them ALOT! I can't wait for the spring when we can go outside and do something and we don't have to watch what we eat and work out as much in fear of gaining those horrible winter pounds. They are a pain to get off and we have realized this year that next winter will be different. :) Cooper has even put on the pounds but for him its probably a good thing!

We have so many fun plans this summer and I can't wait to go out and do them. So please weather no more snow, wind, or cold weather. Lets just stick to the beautiful spring time weather!!

Holiday Time!

2009-12-03T16:19:00.001-07:00

So theory is, that bad things come in 3's right? Well I used to say that its just a stupid theory but after the past couple of weeks we have had I would say it is very true! Austin and I have been having this feeling at work that he is going to get layed off for several different reasons. First he took at 22% pay cut and then work decided that they wouldn't work with his school schedule which then came to only getting 35 hours a week instead of 40. May not seem like a huge deal but with the 22% pay cut and 5 hour cut it wasn't a good combination at all! Austin started looking for a job about a month ago and had no luck until he found the perfect job for him at overstock as their Jr. accountant. Which is what he is going into! So he quickly applied. As time goes on, I got really sick with what I thought was the flu but it turned out to be something different, right now we are thinking its a gall bladder issue, but still nothing has been confirmed. So right now we are at 2 bad things......... I was just waiting for the next bad thing to happen and sure enough the day we are leaving for Chicago to see my family for Thanksgiving # 3 happens! Austin finds out he is being let go the day he gets back from Chicago. BUT he did get the job at Overstock and I also got a part time job at a Salon. So my theory of bad things coming in 3's in now that for every 3 bad things you get one-two good thing! :) I must say we have truly been blessed in more ways then one and I am so grateful for this time of year because it makes you look at your lives and realize how truly fortunate we all are.

When we were in Chicago we went down town to see "the Adams family" the musical (which was so funny!) . As we were walking out there were 5 kids with big bags of clothes talking to a homeless man on the street giving him stuff from their bags. My heart sunk and I was so impressed with those kids and how they were giving to the homeless and who knows, that could have made his day. Normally people in Chicago are getting mad at people for standing to close to their purse. haha I was at the movie theatre and was giving my dad a hard time for not being there earlier enough... (there was a little line but he told me there wouldn't be :) ) I laughed with my dad about it and some guy turns around and says " its just because the movie isn't out yet" then turns his head. If it wasn't for my husband to stop me I would have let that guy have it. I wanted to say " my name is ashlyn nice to meet you sense I asked you" haha So needless to say having that little experience in Chicago made me feel better and know that there are nice people in Chicago. :)

I have also decided that I am done seeing movies about the south! We went and saw "the blind side" and it made me miss the south soo much that I can't see stuff like that anymore. haha My poor husband. It was an amazing movie though. I will say though my husband kept looking over at me the entire movie and kept saying " you would do this", "you would do that", " you would say that". I think he now appreciates the way I am now after seeing that movie.

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Thanksgiving Time!

2009-11-16T16:33:00.001-07:00

Thanksgiving time is by far my favorite time of year. The one thing that drives nuts is when people start wearing Christmas stuff and we havn't even had Thanksgiving yet! Its like we totally forget about Thanksgiving time. :)

This year Austin and I get to go to Chicago to see my family for Thanksgiving and I can't wait. I love going home because its like we can get away from all the chaos that happens on an day to day bases. Austin recently took a major pay cut and cut of hours and it was hard because he has been with the company for almost 3 years. The company is struggling financially and we felt that he needed to start to look for another job. With this horrible economy it makes it super hard! We truly have been blessed though because the first interview he had they offered him the job. He applied for a job at Overstock as there jr accountant/account manager, WHICH is so much better because that is what he is going into. I must say we do have someone looking out for us and I am very greatful for that.

I recently got really sick last friday night early saturday morning. I thought I had the flu but it wouldn't go away. I finally sucked it up and went to the doctor to find out that I have to get a ultra sound done, blood drawn, as well as a endoscope (where they stick a camera down my throat to look at my stomach). The doctor is thinking its my galblader, hypo thyroid, or a gultin free problem. So needless to say it has been a rough couple of weeks haha. I have realized through all of this that I am greatful for my husband. He is truly my best friend and I couldn't have asked for a better friend/companion. Crappy things can help, you can lose a job, be sick, and even lose friends but I will always have him and in all honesty that is all I need in my life.

I honestly love this holiday year and expecially Thanksgiving and thought that I would list some of the things I am thankful for sense Thanksgiving is next week of course! :)

1. My husband
2. Cooper
3. My family
4. My inlaws and brother and sister in laws
5. My adorable Nephew
6. A brother in law on a Mission
7. My mom and dad because they are truly examples to me
8. The gospel
9. My friends
10. A JOB
11. My home
12. Food that I can provide to my family
13. Tithing
14. Prayer
15. My savior

Those are to list just a few. They always say to write down things that your greatful for because then you can see what all you have and how those little things in life that seem horrible just don't seem so horrible after all once you realize what all you really have. HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Our Fun Summer

2009-10-02T13:52:00.000-06:00

I am a horrible Blogger! I can manage to read everyone else's blogs but can't even update my own, isn't that so sad. :)Our lives have been so busy this summer and now that it is fall we are able to enjoy ourselves and that is the biggest relief! We sat down at the beginning of the week (like we always do) to look at what we had going on for this week and realized we had NOTHING! But of course it quickly got filled up with Birthday dinners and the Duck hunt that just opened this weekend. I love Fall, its such a pretty time of year and I am glad that we are able to enjoy it!

Our summer has been filled with Lake Powell, New York, Orlando, Family in town, mission farewells, baby blessings, Birthdays, and just pure fun with friends. I went to New York with my mother in law and 2 sister in laws (with one missing!). We had a blast! It has been awhile sense I have been to New York and within the first hour of being there I realized I am not a East coast person. The people are so short and I swear they never smile! haha By the end of that day I was so annoyed I realized I was acting just like them and quickly stopped. I love New York but its just a place to visit for me! I do have to say though shopping in New York is the best shopping EVER! I spent a lot more then I thought I would AND could have spent more for sure. It did rain the WHOLE time expect for our very last day and that was the day we went to Central Park. I think I could build a little cottage and live in central park! It was beautiful!!! We also had the chance to see the musical Chicago and I have seen lots of Broadway musicals because my parents moved to Chicago, BUT this was amazing! My sister in law got us 2nd row tickets which made the show much better!! And even Jerry Springer was in it, he played the lawyer and I was actually really impressed with how well he can sing. When I got back from New York, Austin dropped me off at home and headed back to work. I walked up stairs and came back down and Cooper had diarrhea with blood I might add! Of course I just freaked out and cleaned it up and he went 4 more times after that in about 20 min. So I called Austin up and he told me that he had been just fine so it was weird he was doing that so........ I took him to the vet. I explain to the nurse what is going on and she says " has he had any trauma going on right now like a move?" I said " nope, I have been gone for 5 days and just got back into town and this is what happened" so she smiles and says " hold on I am going to get the doctor". Needless to say my dog was sick because I left!!!! Are you kidding me!!!! The doctor told me that he didn't realize that I had left until I came home with my stuff and then he realized I had left him and stressed himself out! mamas boy???? :)

Lake Powell was another fun adventure this summer. We decided to take Cooper with us and I have to admit we were both a little nervous! But he was an angel, he had so much fun swimming and running up and down the sand, he seriously looked like he was in heaven. Although Austin lost his wedding ring in Lake Powell this year, so his ring is now with everyone else's rings, cell phones, wallets, you name it down at the bottom of Powell. We say that if Lake Powell ever goes away we will be the first ones there to see what all we can get. haha. We left Thursday night and stayed in this little PO dunk town WHICH was so much fun. We walked into our motel and just started laughing and of course did not sleep on the sheets! haha. It was our last Lake Powell trip with Zack (Austins brother who just left on a mission) so it was extra special trip.
Austins brother and my brother in law left to Argentina for a 2 year mission about 2 weeks ago and he did amazing on his talk. I was very impressed with him he is going to be an amazing missionary and the people are just going to love him. It was sad to see him go but we know he is going to be an amazing missionary! WE LOVE YOU ZACK!

We also had the chance to go Las Vegas this summer as well with 2 of our really good friends. I always had a hard time with making friends at work because I keep to myself and like to keep work and my regular life separate. (weird I know!) Well we started hanging out with some friends at work and I have to say they are the coolest couple! We absolutely love them. We went to Vegas with them and had a blast! Austin now has a gym buddy to go with as well. This guy is training for UFC fighting and so Austin gets some good work out tips from him and she is my shopping buddy, she manages to find the cheapest things! and I thought I was good. We have played games with them a lot and I thought Austin and I were bad at talking crap to each other but they have managed to beat us on that, BUT I must say I still always win at games!!! Needless to say, I have stopped being anti social at work haha
I have also started decorating my house for the Fall season and with a bigger house now I need more furniture and I didn't realize that until I got all my decorations out. So we are on the hunt for furniture!!! (tables and such) I also have 2 rooms upstairs that look so bare and need help! So my project is to finish my salon in the basement, get furniture, and fix those 2 rooms!!! This could take awhile though because Austin and I tend to by random things every once in awhile, we get on these kicks of " oh that would be sweet to get that!" so this week it was MTN bikes......... I know I know summer is over but they were a good deal and what can I say you can't pass up a good deal right???
I am excited for Thanksgiving this year too because number 1 its my favorite holiday and number 2 we get to go to CHICAGO this year!! and we are going to bring Cooper...... it will be VERY interesting. I told the vet I needed something to knock him out and he goes " oh a little Tylenol will work" I go "no I need something stronger than that he is the worlds biggest mamas boy and baby", so we are going to knock him out haha. It'll be fun to take him home though, I hate leaving him at home, I feel like I am abandoning him. Although Austin tells me he doesn't even know I left, I still fell like he knows! :)

Basketball

2009-04-27T15:23:00.000-06:00

As most of you already know I am a die hard fan of the Mavs. Well during the NBA finals I have to admit I was a little nervous for my team. We lost to the Spurs last year and we got stuck playing them again. Well for all you none Basketball fans. The spurs are #3 in their conference and we are #6, so the odds are not very high for us beating them. The Mavs have a thing for not just winning or losing by a little its either we win by creaming or lose by embarrassment. First game goes by and The Mavs win not only do we beat them but on their home court. Second game we get creamed!!! So at this point we are 1:1. Well we head back to our home court which if they are anything like the Jazz we would do very well at home, but yet still it had me worried. The 3rd game starts and I have never seen a score like I did in all my times of watching the finals with the Mavs.... we beat them 88- 67, now that is a pretty low scoring game but hey we beat them!. I would like to say that after the 4th game the Mavs are now up 3:1! Against my negative attitude they came out and surprised me. We head back to the Spurs home court and I hope we can pull off another win! Now on Saturday nights game, I was little upset with Dirk, he is supposed to be our star player and he only made 9 attempt shots and pretty sure he made 4 of them. This guy is 7 feet tall and stood on the 3 point line and our guard who is 6 foot was getting our rebounds. I have never been so ticked off at him! He looked like he hadn't played a game of basketball in his life! Not to mention the fact that a rookie is out doing him.

Now to talk about the Jazz and Lakers.... I must say I do like the Jazz on one condition... THEY ARE NOT PLAYING THE MAVS! I have to stay strong with my team. I was kinda hoping that the Jazz would be the Lakers even though they are favored to win. I can't stand Kobe! Like most people would say. I was talking to a friend who is a huge Lakers fan and he was going on and on and on about how he thinks Jazz fans hate and want to kill Kobe. I told him I hate to break it to him but I think most of the United States thinks that! haha. He asked me why I didn't like Kobe, my answers were simple. " he is cocky, pig headed, rude, selfish, and prideful, BUT he is an amazing basketball player", so I then asked, why don't you like dirk, he says " hes stupid and he over does it", I then said " thats it??? you are about to tell me that is your reason you don't like him? ". I guess my point is, if you are going to dislike a player make sure you have good reasoning and not " hes stupid" haha I will be the first to admit that Dirk is an idiot sometimes but he is/can be a good player. Saturday night he was an idiot. :)

If the Mavs go far enough to play the Lakers I will be the first to say ( IF we lose) that the lakers are the better team. You can't stand up for a team when they did horrible, if you want to talk stats then talk stats but you can't talk stats if your star player only makes 9 attempted shots! :)

Orlando and Cali

2009-03-29T19:27:00.000-06:00

So Austin and I had the chance to go to California and Orlando! We both got new positions at work and so he is the event cordinator and I do the awards for the events, so it makes it fun that we get to travel together. And on friday I actually moved desks and so now im 2 desks down from him now! I get to now watch him. Everyone has always given us such a hard time for working with eachother. We always get the question, " how can you guys work with eachother, I could never work with my spouse". Austin and I have always been like "why?". We LOVE working with eachother, we have that type of relationship where we love being with eachother all the time, its actually probably pathetic haha. I can't imagine what it will be like once he is done with school and we don't work with eachother anymore. What more could be better? Working with your best friend and person you love more than anything.... my answer is... nothing! :)

We had a blast in California and Orlando. We went to Disney Land in Cali and Universal in Orlando. It was awesome! Not only that but it was our first time going there with eachother, so that was very fun. We worked so hard when we were there that it was so nice to have a day to just have fun! We actually get to go to Orlando again in October for work so we love it!

We also got a new flat screen tv this weekend! Austin has been wanting one so bad so finally we caved in and bought one. Which we love it, its always nice to have a big TV.

Our anniversary is coming up in 2 weeks!!!!! CRAZY! I can't believe we have already been married a year, its so fun! So I can't wait for that, we have some fun things planned. I never understood why the frist year is the hardest and I can honestly say I still don't understand. This has been the best year, we have had so much fun and I can honestly say I couldn't have asked for a better husband he is awesome and I never doubt for one second that he loves me more than anything in the world. :) We have a wonderful relationship and I wouldn't trade what we have for anything.

I am ready for the winter to be over!! I hate it when its cold, I told Austin the other day to start looking up jobs for when he graduates in warm states, mostly Texas though. :) He is all for it so that makes it nice. We actually get to go to Texas in September so then I can show him why I love it so much! Hopefully I'll beable to convince him. Im taking him in September which isn't to bad so instead of taking him in July where he would say " no we are NEVER moving here" I'll take him when its perfect! I told him that in Utah we start the cars in the winter to warm them up and in Texas we always started the cars up in the summer to cool them down. haha I know what yall are thinking " ugh " but trust me, I love it there....... so cross our fingers he will love it too! :) Now I do have to say this I don't hate Utah, I actually really do love it here, its beautiful and I wouldn't mind staying here BUT its way to cold here!!! I love it in Texas, the people the weather and the Church out there is AMAZING, so we will see what happens.

Valentines Day

2009-02-15T20:07:00.000-07:00

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY! First and for most. I am late but I do love Valentines day. Its kinda a cheesy holiday but its fun to beable to have such a fun day to spend with people you love!

We had a wonderful day, we kept it very low key becuase we both got new positions at work which allow us to travel which we both love alot! So we are going to California this weekend and then after that we head out to Florida! I can't wait. We will be working but we decided to stay a few extra days to enjoy being in the warm weather.

We did the typical thing for us on Vday, dinner and a movie! That is usually a weekend for us. But Austin got me a pedicure and beautiful flowers. It was perfect. our first Valentines day together married. We are also coming up on our year and its crazy how fast time has gone by, it feels like we just got married! :)

Cooper got his tally fixed on last week, so its been a fun week with him. Most of the things I read were... " once they have been fixed they calm down, stop biting... blah blah blah...." well I am here to say that the only thing he has stopped doing is oh wait NOTHING!!! haha I still think its because hes only 8 months so he is still a puppy. I do have to say though he does sleep more, which is really nice for Austin and I. He is such a good little guy.

The other day Austin and I were talking about kids (not planning on them yet haha) but I told him that for awhile I always wondered if I would be a good mom. I know that I will be the best I can be but I look at other moms and I think " wow they are sooo patient and loving I hope I can be that way". This may sound so stupid but once we got Cooper I didn't realize how protective I am of him and he is just my dog. I watch him when little kids play with him, I make sure he isn't getting into trouble, the typical mommy thing. I realized then that I will be a great mom! I can only imagine how I will be with a child if I am this bad with my dog! So it makes me excited to have kids knowing that I have full confidence in myself. I have babysat kids my whole life but for some reason it was just one of those " can I really be a great mom?"BUT we had some friends over the other night and she has 2 girls and once they left Austin and I turned to eachother and said " no kids!!!". When we first got married it was 4, then 3,and then we were happy at 2 and now we don't want any! haha I am totally kidding I think we are going to sit at 2 so we will see what is in store for us :)

Tragic Puppy stories/dreams

2009-01-06T19:48:00.000-07:00

During Christmas when we were in Chicago visiting my family we went and saw the movie "marley and me" Which I have to say was a super cute move! Although I cried not just tears coming down but bawled. Austin gives me a hard time for being so sensitive with animal movies. I choose not to see movies that have animals dying, getting hurt, etc. So basically everytime we see a movie and he knows something bad is about to happen to an animal he makes sure I close my eyes so he isn't humiliated by my bawling. I am so bad that when they have those things on TV with the sad music about how animals are getting abused and need homes or to have you donate money to save them, I call and donate because I bawl through the whole thing! Or I can watch someone dying on TV but if it is ANY type of animal Im gone! I can't even watch animal planet because I don't like watching the animals fight each other. I know I know I am pathetic! If I could make sure every animal has a home I would because it breaks my heart to know that people treat animals the way they do sometimes.

I was watching the news a few weeks ago.... I know this is a horrible story so be prepared..... BUT the news was talking about a women whos house got broken into and she got home and saw that there was smoke coming from the kitchen and opened the ove to find her 3 month old poodle in there!! I literally bawled not only that but the entire time they were talking about this they were showing the little puppy with home videos. So don't worry that night I had a horrible dream that Cooper got stuck in the oven. THEN I came home from work to find Cooper not is his kennel!!!! And sure enough I check the oven! Come to find out Austin had gotten out of class early and had taken Cooper with him to run errands.

So on Sunday night I fell asleep and had yet another weird dream. I had a dream that someone broke into our house and Austin told me to run and hide so I ran into our other bedroom under the bed (with cooper of course) and then I realized that wasn't such a good place to hide so for some strange reason I went into the dryer ( who knows!! ) While Austin is doing whatever he is doing with the robber in our bedroom, Cooper barks and so the robber comes and puts chairs by the dryer so we can't escape and turns it on. So being the loving wife I am I am yelling " help help I have a dog in here and he isn't breathing help me out hurry". So Austin tells me " wow ash thanks for being concerned at wether or not Im ok". Which he should know by now Cooper is my main priority haha jk. So basically a long story short I realize I have had some pretty strange dreams and I hope they NEVER come true!!! Not only that but I have pretty pathetic to have been so concerned about my dog then if my husband is okay in the other room! haha

Holiday Season

2008-12-30T19:35:00.000-07:00

So much has gone on during the Holiday season, just to name a few things.....
1. Thanksgiving with my new husband
2. Austins Birthday
3. My parents coming into town
4. Cooper loosing his horrible razor sharp teeth
5. Bonus at work!!
6.Christmas Decorations
7.Cooper learning new tricks
8.Not having to watch Cooper every second to make sure he isn't getting into everything
9. Going to Chicago for Christmas
10.MALLORY AND CASEY FINALLY having their cute new baby boy Beck
11. Finally getting all of the Friends episodes
12. Getting Lots of snow (just because its pretty)
13. Sliding to the car in Chicago
14. Being able to stand on snow because it was iced over in Chicago
15. Going from -29 to 50 degrees in Chicago

This holiday season has been so full of fun things and I couldn't be more happy to have such a loving family and a wonderful husband to spend the time with. Cooper has become such a good dog. He is also finally getting out of his puppy stage so hes more calm and its nice not having to watch every move he makes (but thats because I am a bit OCD). Austin and I went to the gym and I left him home for almost 2 hours and he was an angel, which was a very very good thing.

Austin and I went to Chicago for Christmas this year and we had a VERY great Christmas! Minus the one day it was -7 but felt like -29 and then two days later it was 54....... very interesting. We got snow, fog, ran, wind, warm and cold weather. So basically we got it all! Austin also gained 9 pounds due to my moms cooking, which is odd because she only does this when he comes...... :) But no worries we have been home for 3 days and he has already lost 6 of it! Wouldn't it be nice to not doing anything and just lose weight? Chicago was really fun because we got to do lots of fun things with my family that Austin got to be apart of. My family loves, music, sports, and musicals and so Austin got to join us in on that. And as well Austin brought his card playing games and we played lots of those as well. We are very glad we were able to go to Chicago to spend time with my family its always fun when we all get together because they don't live close. Hopefully one of these days they wont be so far away!

I think the highlight of coming back was Mal and Casey having their baby boy FINALLY!! After being late 3 days he came, and he is the most adorable baby ever! It was very weird seeing my two best friends having a child, but at the same time it was a comforting feeling knowing that they are doing it first so when it is my turn she can give me tips! :) He is such a good baby only crys when you try to wake him up (at least when we were there thats all he did ). He is such a tiny baby too, but it fits those to perfectly! Mallory looks great and looks like a new mommy full of joy and love. Casey is a great dad already you can tell he just loves this new little one more than anything. Makes me excited to have alittle one!! (don't get any ideas it wont be for awhile..... HOPEFULLY)

I am so greatful for this holiday season and how much it makes you realize you have and to also realize the true meaning of Christmas. I remember one Christmas my family bought chirstmas presents for a family that didn't have much and wasn't going to have a Christmas. We went over Chirstmas Eve when they were out and when we walked in the door they had 3 presents under the tree and it broke my heart. It made me realize how lucky I was to beable to have a Christmas every year. The next day at church the kids came up to us and said " guess what!!!! santa came to our house!! he NEVER comes to our house!" at that moment my heart just broke and I was so greatful I had the chance to do that. I hope we all remembered the true meaning of Chirstmas and how greatful we all are to be blessed in the families we do have and for of course Christ and all he does for us. MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Choice or Decision?

2008-11-04T19:44:00.000-07:00

I am not the type to post churchy stuff on here but I had a wonderful lesson in my sunday school class at church on sunday and found it intersting to share.........

My bishop in my ward is a wonderful man. He is very honest and straight to the point which is my kind of bishop. He gave a lesson on the difference between choice and decision. He had a lady get up and asked her " do you want chocolate or vanilla ice cream" she says " chocolate" our bishop then asks her "why" the lady says " well because I like chocolate better of course" he goes on to talk about how she is making a decision. In my eyes Im thinking okay so what? He gives an example of a choice, you choose to make decisions in your life for example. I can choose to marry my wife or I can choose to marry the red head. I will never be happy with all my choices in my life. " I can look at my wife and think after a year of marriage ugh she squeezes the tooth paste from the top and not the bottom im so stupid for picking her I will get a divorce and marry the red head, and then a year from that marriage I will pick out the problems as well and never be fully happy with my choice."

Its interesting to me because he tells us that we make CHOICES in our lives not decisions, we may make the wrong choice or the right choice but its how we choose to take those choices. If we make a bad choice we move on from the bad choice and learn from it and let it go. He also talks about Forgivness and how it goes hand in hand. That to truly forgive is a choice we make, we can choose to forigve or we can choose to hold a grudge. What we choose is then our decision.

I am a person who chooses to learn from my mistakes and also from the good choices I make in my life. I am not a perfect person and have made some horrible choices in my life! But I have chosen in my life as a decision to learn from it to grow and become a better person. Its not anyone elses fault if I choose to do something I know is not right, because by making a choice I have to deal with what is in store of that choice wether it be good or bad.

Chocolate or Vanilla? " I choose niether because I have chosen to not like ice cream " ;)

Update on our Family

2008-10-02T20:54:00.000-06:00

So it has taken me awhile to figure out how to work this blog spot.... you think that I would have caught on sooner but then again I havn't really had time to sit down and play around. :) To start out Austin and I have been married for almost 6 months now CRAZY how fast time goes by. We are enjoying being married and being able to be with eachother all the time, even at work. Austin and myself work at United first Financial. Its a program software that helps people pay down their mortgage and debt. Austin just a promotion and we are sooo happy! Promotions come with great raises too and we wont complain! We are looking into getting our own place soon and can't wait for that!

We just bought a puppy about 3 months ago, he is a maltipoo and we love him soo much! His name is Cooper and I will say he is a mamas boy!!! He is still in the puppy stage right now so we can't wait for his teeth to fall out so he stops nibbling on our fingers but we wouldn't trade him for the world.