Marriage...Year 1

So I have become really horrible at writing in my journal, so I decided that this is going to be my journal from now on! Plus, it is so much faster to type than it is to write, and I can update this just about anywhere I go. :)

I know I haven't even gotten around to writing about our engagement and wedding day, but just because I'm lazy I'm going to start with what happened since the wedding.

Our honeymoon was amazing.  We spent 5 days on a Carnival Caribbean cruise.  We flew out to Florida, and after staying overnight in a really nice hotel that Andrew's half sister Kelly hooked us up with, we hopped on our cruise.  Can I just say how much I love cruises?  We were able to relax, eat, sleep ;) as much as we wanted, and we went on some pretty awesome excursions. At our first stop in the Cayman islands, we went on an excursion to the Sting Ray Sand Bar, and we got to swim with sting rays out in the middle of the ocean, and kiss them and feed them. We also met a pretty cool couple that I still keep in touch with, and hung out with them at 7 mile beach after the sting rays.  The beach was absolutely gorgeous!  The sand was made up of teeny tiny sea shells, and we went snorkeling near the shore where there were some neat little tropical fish.  I even saw a little swordfish swimming around near the top of the water!

Our next stop on the cruise was in Cozumel, Mexico. It was a cool little place to go shopping and see a little bit of what Mexico is like while still being in a relatively safe place - (my Mom was super worried about us going to Mexico because of all the drug wars happening and Americans getting kidnapped). After getting lost for a little bit, we finally made our way to the main Piazza and found a guy who would take Andrew out scuba diving in two different places, and I could just snorkel above them during the dive. One of the guys on the boat was really gay for Andrew.  He was literally gay, and kept hitting on him!  It was pretty funny.

The sad thing is that the biggest memory that I have of snorkeling in one of the most beautiful places in the world is how bad I had to pee!  I tried so hard to go in the ocean for over 2 hours, but I just couldn't.  Needless to say, the next day I got my first bladder infection.  I didn't know I had one, but as the days progressed, I just kept getting more nauseated.  I still enjoyed myself so much though the rest of the trip.  After the cruise was over, Andrew and I drove to Orlando and we went to Disneyworld for two days. My roommate/best friend Krissa Jo Tew from college worked there at the time doing audio for the parades, and she got us  in for free both of the days. She came around with us the second day and we had so much fun with her!  She got me and Andrew the Mickey and Minnie bride & groom hats, so we were given a lot of special attention. During the Indiana Jones show, we were picked to be some of the extras, so we got to be part of the show which was really neat!  Somebody tried to steal the Chewbacca backpack that I had bought for Andrew, but I gave them a talking-to and they gave it back. Andrew also got to be in the Lion King show, we got special privileges on the rides, and we were given free desserts.  It was seriously the perfect honeymoon. Even with feeling like I was going to vomit the whole time we were at Disneyworld, it was seriously one of the best trips I have ever been on!

The next week we had a kind of second honeymoon, where Andrew and I drove up to Washington, and my Mom put on two open houses for us - one in Vancouver, WA where I grew up, and the other where they live now in Olympia, WA. They were both really nice, and it was great to see a lot of people that I grew up with but hadn't seen in years.

After we got back from our honeymoon, we moved into our first apartment. It was the craziest month of trying to find furniture and unpack everything.  I finally got all of our apartment necessities unpacked after a month of living there, when Andrew's Mom came over for dinner and asked us to move into her house.  Randy had taken a job in Bolivia, and Kathy decided to go out and join him. After thinking through it for a few days, Andrew and I decided it would be a good move for us (even though I had always sworn that I never would live with parents after I was married :)). Especially because of the nightmare that had been going on at our apartment complex.  We moved to Midvale, which is just south of Salt Lake. We decided on the apartment because it looked updated, it was the best price that I could find in the area, and because it was close to trax/the freeway. Unfortunately, after we moved in and found a cockroach on the door, our neighbors doing drugs, and seeing police cars in the parking lot every night, I decided to look online at reviews for the apartment.  I almost had a heart attack after reading the 100+ horrible reviews about neighbors breaking in and stealing expensive things, cockroach issues, lots of domestic violence, and everyone smoking inside.  I called up the manager the next day saying I wanted to move out, and he was so nice and said that if after a month I still felt that way, we could move out and get our deposit back. So after having our chainsmoking neighbors above us flood our apartment, we decided to take Kathy up on her offer and move into their house in Highland.

So in July, Andrew and I moved in with our inlaws.  Kira had just left for college at BYU, so we had the whole house to ourselves, except for the infrequent visits when Randy and Kathy would come home.  Honestly, they've been home a lot more than I expected, but it hasn't been bad.  The only time that it was a struggle was in November/December/Early January.

During this time I was still working at Durham Brands.  The company had just sold our scrapbooking brand Imaginisce, and I was super stressed because the workload  between the three designers (me, Stace, and my boss Don) had gone down significantly, and they were laying people off.  I was always on edge at work because I didn't have anything to do, and I felt like my job was on the line.  In all honesty, I felt like Stace's job was more on the line than mine was, but I wanted to be the one to leave before she did.  So I went and found a new job at a home decor/scrapbooking company down in Provo through a recruiter. They offered me the job after the first interview, and I negotiated a $5,000 pay raise.  I had also negotiated some time off for an upcoming family vacation, but I found out after solidifying the whole thing that they weren't actually going to give it to me.  I started getting a bad feeling about the company, but I felt like I needed to take it anyways.  So the next day I met with my boss Don, and told him I was leaving the company.  There was a lot of tension between us because of fighting over work to do, and he had snapped at me in a meeting in front of everyone in the company, and things just never got better after that.  Anyways, after I told him about my new job, I met with Ben Durham and Mark Durham, and they told me that they didn't want me to leave and wanted to make me a counter offer. When they told me that it was as if a huge weight lifted off my shoulder, and I knew that staying there was the right decision.  So they offered me a $10,000 pay raise, and made me a product designer instead of a graphic designer.  Ben was going to be my boss instead of Don, and I was going to be salary instead of hourly, and work an extra hour every day.

So while I was going through the whole stress of learning a new job in November, and working more and more and dealing with my Seasonal Affective Disorder, Andrew's entire family came to live at the house for a month.  Kathy brought home Molly's two oldest kids Olivia and Nate to stay with us for two weeks.
Andrew and I drove to Washington to spend Thanksgiving with my parents, and it was a nice little trip.  I needed the break from work and from the craziness at Andrew's house. Everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) had come to stay because Michael came home from his mission in early December. It was a lot of drama living with 14 people and trying to learn a new job.  I was stressed beyond belief, and I'm honestly so glad it is over!  I think it was just everything kind of happening at the same time that overwhelmed me.

After everyone moved out in January, life started to get back to normal.  I was the personal progress leader in the YW, and Andrew was teaching the 8-10 year old boys in Primary. I later got called into Mia Maids and have been really enjoying it.

In April, I flew out with Kent to go and visit Cherie and her new baby Grant. Andrew was in school so he couldn't go. I have been really praying for him a lot because he struggled in school a lot in 2013. He didn't tell me, but while we were engaged he was depressed and stopped trying in his engineering classes.  I think he was so worried about losing me that he took the time he would have dedicated to school and gave the attention and time to me instead. He also said he really struggled with getting out of bed in the morning. The sad thing is that I didn't find this out until about 6 months after we were married. It was hard for me to hear, but I really wanted to show him that I believed in him turning things around so I went to the temple and fasted and prayed for him a lot so that he could get back into school.  He had failed so many classes that he was suspended fall semester. It was strange having him at home for 7 months without a full-time job and not in school, but he worked hard to keep himself busy. He was also working with his friend DJ Burton doing a race company that they had started together.

After a lot of work, he was able to get back into school this last winter semester, but if he failed a class he would have been suspended again.  I was so worried about him the whole semester because he had a hard time with his chemistry and calculus classes. I barely saw him because he would be up until midnight most nights doing homework.  The good thing is that he got a B in chemistry, the sad thing is that he got a D in calculus. But hey, he passed!  He met with a counselor a couple of weeks ago and they said that they think he might have a learning disability with math.  So he's taking tests to find out if he does have it.

The last big thing that happened this last year, is that we went to ITALY for vacation!!  It was a vacation with Andrew's entire family.  It was a little disappointing in Rome because it was busy beyond belief.  They were Sainting two popes the weekend we were there, and it was an Italian holiday, and it was high travel season.  So Rome was insane, people got lost, and it rained on us really hard.  I also didn't have time to see anyone that I knew from my mission there, so I just say that visit to Rome doesn't really count, and Andrew and I need to go back in the next few years to have an awesome experience. ;)

We hopped on our Norwegian cruise in Civitaveccia after our 2 days in Rome, and shipped out to Napoli.  Andrew and I spent the day with Suzannah and Matt exploring Pompeii, Sorrento, and had a yummy pizza in Naples.  The next day we spend in Messina, Sicily, and we hung out with one of the sisters from my mission Sorella Gambardella.  It was fun to speak in Italian, and she was so sweet and fun to be around.  The afternoon we spent in Taormina (a cute little touristy town up in the mountains) with Sarah and Christian. Day 4 of the cruise was one of my favorites.  We spent the day in Kotor, Montenegro, and it was by far one of the most beautiful places that I have ever been!  We hiked up to some castle ruins, and spent the rest of the time wandering around the old city, which was really preserved and just beautiful.  Day 5 we spent in Split, Croatia where they have Diocletian's palace.  We did a guided tour and learned a lot about the place.  It wasn't my favorite site, but it was still pretty interesting. Day 6 we spent in a 3rd ex-Yugoslavia country - Koper, Slovenia. We weren't super interested in seeing the city, so instead we went to a cave that had a huge canyon in it with an underground river. The last stop on our cruise was Venice, Italy. Andrew and I celebrated our first anniversary there, since we were going to be on a plane the entire next day for our actual anniversary. We went on a gondola ride, saw St. Mark's cathedral, bought 2 Venetian masks - Andrew got the joker, and I got a music mask (they are made out of paper mache, and paper is the first anniversary gift after all!), and had a nice dinner at a super expensive restaurant near the Rialto bridge. It was such a nice day together.

All in all, I gained about 4 pounds on the cruise/in Italy.  That's pretty impressive considering I only gained 15 pounds after a year and a half in Italy on my mission. ;)

So those are the highlights from the last year!  It has been quite the crazy ride, but I have really enjoyed being married to Andrew.  He is a good husband and it has been fun watching him in his primary class, interacting with the little kids.  He's really creative with kids and teaching.  He would make a really good teacher (his dream was always to be a spanish teacher). He is very thoughtful, forgiving and kind to me. Even when I am a grouchy brat, he will still hug me and forgive me and be patient with me.  He's forgiving of other people's faults, and it is something that I really appreciate about him.