Almost Graduation!!

We have 7 weeks tell Austin graduates and we go on our much needed vacation!! First off I am so excited for Austin, he has worked so hard to get his Bachelors in Accounting and I know he will feel happy once its over. Austin graduates on May 5th, graduation starts at 10 and goes tell 12. We then have to run to the airport to catch a flight to Florida at 2:30pm. We will be rushing but we will be so excited to go and I'm sure it'll all work out. We get to go on a Caribbean Cruise! I am seriously so excited, not only is it a graduation present for Austin but my family is going too which always is awesome. We leave Sunday morning and head to Key West, then we have a day at Sea, Grand Cayman, Jamaica, and one last day at sea before we come home. Once we get back Austin starts his Masters program that next week. Talk about cramming stuff in, we must be good at that. Austin said if he even took the rest of the summer off it would be hard to go back so we are just plugging forward!

I couldn't be more proud of him for doing this, I know its been hard because he started so much later than most people but he has done so well and been so motivated that I think this was the perfect time for him to do this. Now to just get through the Masters program and CPA stuff!!! Thank goodness we waited to have kids that's all I have to say. :)

Austin has been looking for a job sense Nov of last year, nothing to serious just something more in accounting and that pays more! Overstock has been great and came at the perfect time but with him graduating I know he wants to find something more in his field. He applied for a job at the end of Feb. Went through the interview process and found out he was 1 of 130 applicants and was on the lower end of experience (which we know, he hasn't even graduated haha). I wasn't really expecting a call back because of that comment but he got a second interview and GOT THE JOB!!! It was crazy. But then..... Overstock found out and didn't want to lose him. I figured they wouldn't pay him more than what the other company was offering so I didn't worry about it. I get a call from Austin saying "you are never going to believe what happened... Overstock is offering me a manager position and more than what the other company is offering". I was blown away to say the least. So needless to say he is at Overstock still haha. Couldn't turn down the opportunity and money they were offering, plus they have been so good to us and he has been there for 2 years so he has paid his dues. haha The past few months have been full of fun exciting things and I am glad we are moving in the right direction... ITS ABOUT TIME!!!

As for me we went through a new ownership change again at the Salon and I couldn't be more happy about it! They are great to work for and have given our little salon some tender love and care and looks great! We have been busier and I am very grateful for that. I am a stress er so its been nice to be busy again and not be called "lazy daisies" and have a good salon name!!!

Cooper is getting to be a big boy! He has for sure put on his winter pounds, I swear his fur is thicker this year. Austin took him for a run the other day and said it was more of a walk/run for Cooper. He has been weasing alot lately too so he is going to be running every night to get this winter weight off! He gets his haircut next week too by the lady that he has been going to for forever and I found her again! She ended up leaving the place and wasn't able to grab all her clients numbers so Cooper's last haircut to say the least was AWFUL! So I am grateful to have found her. Hopefully with the Haircut and running he can slim down so people stop telling me "wow he has gained weight!". Why is it okay for people to say that about animals but not people? I'm pretty sure you wouldn't like it if I walked up to your child and said "wow he/she has gained some weight!!" hahaha yes he is my child so back off there isn't much I can do in the winter. :)

After the last year of working our butts off I can finally say it has paid off and hopefully is only up hill from here....... I guess I can only hope right???? :)

Holidays at the Olsen House

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!

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!!

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!!! :)