Surprise Shower.

Because we live in Utah-we are waving goodbye to only our second month of summer :).  I want to savor every moment of warmth-green-sunshine, but it is quickly leaking its way through my fingers!  Seth and I have a lot that we want to do, and are losing time to do it in.  Hopefully we are able to pack everything in!

We have officially made our one year anniversary plans!  Whoop Whoop-we are both pretty excited that we have plans, and look forward to celebrating our first year of marriage.  We wanted to get out of the State but didn't want to drive too far-Being in the West makes that task difficult since everything is so spread out!  Fortunately we found something cute-out of State-2 hours away-fun activities :). We are going to Twin Falls, Idaho and staying in a quaint little bed and breakfast.  Just thought I would share our plans with you folks.

Last Sunday, Seth and I went on a little hike with some friends of ours.  It was  a pleasant day, nice to get out, and enjoyed the company.

These things were Huge!

And Very Pretty!

Nice View.

The trail we went on was very very Southern-like I would have to say.  We were surrounded by plants and trees.  It smelled like nature and made us miss our South Carolina trees :).

Seth has completed his policy review, which he is very pumped about!  Now he can push forward (his words) with the next phase and see progress.  He is such a little worker.  He has some interviews lined up, and should begin with his thesis paper soon.  We are hoping he is able to schedule some interviews in Southern Utah, so we can take a trip :).  School starts the end of August for him.  

Stephanie and Jay are coming out to visit us the weekend after our anniversary and we are looking forward to seeing them-showing them around our homeplace-taking them out to see 'our valley' and 'our mountains' :).  Whoop!

Last night we had a surprise baby shower for a couple in our HomeGroup (our bible study group).  They are soon to be parents of three little lovely girls (I know the first 2 are-I'm assuming the 3rd will be just as lovely!).  They are a fun couple and we have loved having them in our lives.

Michael and Miranda.  

These two are both born in August and their little one will also share in her parent's birthday month :).  They are from Arkansas and have worked their way out to Utah almost a year before Seth and I.

Their cute little family.

Miranda and I have noticed that Monogramming (which is HUGE where we are both from) hasn't reached the West yet.  I have a lot of things Monogrammed/Embroidered and many people ask me what the letters mean.  Anywho-Seth and I gave their August baby a monkey snuggler with baby's name on it-just because that is a big deal where we are from and hard to get out here where we are now.

Elizabeth and Madilynn opening their big sister gifts.  What a fun idea!

Us Southern Belles :).

These ladies above are all from the South.  Arkansas-Louisiana-South Carolina.  Seth and I appear to have found Southern folks out West and have been sticking with them!  Interesting how creative God is--birthing us in the South, somehow moving us West(none of us girls thought we would move out of the state we were born in), placing others from the South in our paths.  :).  Fun to contemplate in my mind how things come together.

Louisiana friends :).  Jonathan and Marilyn.

Miranda w/ Yummy Cake and Lovely/Fragrant Flowers!

These flowers smelled so good and were beautiful.  Note:  Just look at the mountains out of the window.  How lovely.

Closing out the last week in July and looking forward to a fun last weekend.  I'm sure I will be blogging about our weekend soon.  Hope everyone has a wonderful August!

The Cook's :).

Fun Thursday Nonsense

Whoop Whoop :).  Although I completely enjoyed going home and seeing our family-I thoroughly enjoy being back in Utah and having my routine and day to day life back!  I am definitely a routine type of gal and enjoy a scheduled life (although there are times that I let spontaneous activities happen).

Currently I have been very 'into' books.  Seth and I-or at times just  I- have been going to the DI weekly (which is our GoodWill basically).  They have loads of books-all kinds.  I just stroll myself along to the bookshelves, turn my intrigued little head sideways, and literally read each and every title as well as the author.  Now Mind you-these books are 1-2 dollars based on paper or hardback.  Although I do not need anymore books, I simply have a hard time turning great books down when they are so cheap.  The saddest part of this situation is that I continue to go to the library and rent books that I haven't found/purchased yet.  I almost feel like I have an addiction, but I keep telling myself, they are only a dollar.  I plan to stop renting books from the library (after I read the ones I've already rented out) and start on the ones that I've bought.  :)

China is another thing I am 'into'.  The DI also has dishes, and I would probably purchase 15 different patterns if they would only have matching sets! While at home we went by a Lennox store.  Heaven!  How beautiful everything was!  I basically drooled everytime we passed this store and finally my Mom said we should just go on in.  I wanted each china setting they had out.  Again-I WANTED EVERY china setting they had OUT!  Some of the plates and accessories were only 10 dollars.  At this point in time I despised Utah and living 2100 miles away from this Lennox store.  I just wanted to buy plates and etc up and be serving with them as we speak.  This past Christmas we ate at a friends home who had Christmas china-and she had it all-every beautiful piece that could be.  I dreamed of the day when I would be able to have Christmas china-use them for dinner with my family-use them for dinner parties-HMMMMMMMMM :).  Perfect!  At some point in time in my life all mine and Seth's birthday presents will be Christmas china (because Seth will want me to have it and will use his birthday gift for my China because he loves me and remember-a happy wife is a happy life :)!  haha kidding).

Pretty Pretty :)-Looked like a Christmas present with fruit in my opinion!  Loved it.

Equally beautiful-This one reminded me a tad of Mrs. Cynthia's china-she is able to use it all winter-which would be fun with this type :).

Oh goodness-I need to quite this daydreaming and wanting wanting wanting.  Don't judge my wanting wanting wanting-I'm just expressing fun ideas in my mind and some dreams of mine :).  

Seth and I are back into the grind of life.  He has been approved for his Master's project-Whoop!  He is ready to get started on the interviews and into the next phase of his project now that he has been approved.  As the end of July approaches he has and will be extremely busy with a load on his plate.  That is where I come in and play lovely wife--Keep a tidy home, have supper ready for him, clean, clean, clean the bathroom, clean, and jump up and down when he comes home :).  He is going to play golf this weekend with a friend and is very much looking forward to that.

We are still in the works of planning our 1 year honeymoon.  We celebrated our 11 month anniversary in South Carolina soaking up the sun on the beach-what a way to celebrate!  It has passed so quickly and will be here before we know it :).  Looking forward to many more with this man of mine.

Sorry this is such a noninformative-uninteresing blog but I did enjoy talking about books, china, and Seth :).  Some of my favorite things!

Menu:  We made Chicken Pot Biscuit last night and let me tell you YUMMMMM. We are going to make some type of stuffed shell (it was suppose to be vegetarian-but we weren't having that so we are adding in some meat and comparing it to ravioli!).  We are also going to try a Breakfast Pizza that looks delicious-looking forward to that.  I soo completely wish that you could ship Lemon Meringue Pie, and I would ask Seth's mom to ship us some :)!  I plan to TRY to make it soon-but am not to sure how it will come out.  It is one of Seth's favorite pies-I love it-and we haven't had it in a while-so wish us luck!

Hope everyone's weekend is fun!

The Cook's :)

Beach 2011

WarNing:  This post is long and full of cute pictures.


After placing my 12th plane ride under my belt, I believe I should now be able to call myself a professional.  Not that I necessarily want too-but I can.  Seth and I came to the conclusion yesterday that even if we wanted to stay FAR FAR away from his and my family's we would at least have to move within driving distance so we won't have to fly.  My entire body just goes into airplane shock mode (I actually think this is very very true).  I can't eat or drink anything-I have to visit the bathroom several times throughout the day (I'm sorry to say that but I'm trying to explain it to you folks!)-I can't sleep, hardly can read, and my hands sweat ridiculously.  I can't watch tv-can't listen to music-basically can't do anything but watch the map showing where the plane is at and pray. 

Although I will have to say that flying is beautiful.  It is also pretty neat-it took us 36 hours to drive 2100 miles and only 4 hours to fly it.

Seth and I spent the past week at the beach with my family.  How fun-relaxing-simple it was.  My family has been going to Garden City annually since before I was born-it is something me and my family look forward to every year.  This year I was able to appreciate and understand all that my Aunt's put into the planning and preparing of EVERYTHING.  I was able to appreciate how beautiful the South is-now that I have something to compare it with.  

Arriving in South Carolina on the 7th of July-we were able to spend time with Seth's family.  Seth is on the left looking all cute and what not doing yard work.  On the right are Seth and his 'older' brother Zach :).

Saturday the 9th we left for the beach.  I will go ahead and mention that Seth has THE BEST friends in the world.  I can honestly say I don't think anyone could have pocketed better buddies than my husband.  Tanner and Catherine have come to Utah to visit-Jay and Stephanie are coming mid August to visit.  They keep in contact with Seth and make sure they are around every time we come home to see Seth.  A few of Seth's friends came down to the beach and stayed Saturday to see and hang out with Seth :).

Seth on the left doing his gazing and thinking pose.  I love it when he does this-I think it is too cute :).  On the right is a Sunset one evening-It was beautiful and I ran to get my camera and almost missed it.  It set pretty quickly!

This year all the kids wanted to bury our feet and then wash the sand off.  It was fun-except when they told us it cost one hundred thousand fifty dollars :). Above is my dad with Caroline and Addison.

This year I wanted a big floppy hat to sit out on the beach in.  I thought I was the cutest thing, but some of my family members would beg to differ.

Here are pictures of my gangsta brother and his girlfriend.  Brittany probably doesn't realize what she is getting herself into with 1. my brother and 2. our family-but she fits into the mold :).

My cousin-Olivia and I.  With floppy hats.

My mother :).

'Silly' Grandkid pic.  The last time we did these pictures for our grandparents was about 8 years ago-we've added four more kids since and another husband :). 

The 'girls' :).

My Aunt Suzie had a great idea to get all the family their own tervis tumbler (saving the world:  One beach trip at a time!)  I think they were a big hit and I know we will enjoy having them.  Now if the fam can just remember to bring them all back next year!  Above is a picture of ours.  Aren't they just darlin' :).

Dad and Eason.

Carsyn & Eason-I think this is a cute pic.  She was trying to run away from him though :).


The dock and staying up late is a necessity for our beach trips.  Although I'm not the best at doing this-I certainly try.  Usually its all the men folk that stay up with their gossiping and nonsense.  I gave my husband a curfew for this :)-kidding.

One of the cutest little girls I know-along with the cutest little voice.  She was telling me that she wanted 'pink' ice cream.  I go and get her some 'pink' ice cream and come to find out the cute little girl doesn't even like ice cream :).

Saturday evening after we got back from the beach-I went to see Amanda and Lodon :).  What a cutey!  He has the biggest eyes and the biggest smile and is just to adorable.  Holding and playing with him will make you want one of your own :)-Kidding of course but he was just too sweet.  Good visit to see Amanda and Chris and this precious baby.

Here is my fat baby :).  What a cute pup.  Spoiled rotten pup!


After a wonderful full 10 days-Seth and I made it back home to Utah safely.  Appreciated and enjoyed time with Family-what wonderful families we both have!  

A pic of my wonderful folks-Seth's wonderful in-laws :).

Have a good week everyone!  

The Cook's :).

July??

July??  

I'm having a difficult time understanding where in the world June went!  I guess those myths are true-


1. Time flys when you have fun or 
2. Time flys when you get old.  


I'd prefer to go with the first scenario :).  


Last night Seth and I came to the conclusion that we must have skipped June-going from May to July!

As usual, we've been pretty busy.  I think I always say that though-I bet you guys are starting to really contemplate what we could be busy with.  But I promise we are!

One thing that keeps us busy is FOOD :).  Seth and I both enjoy food--anything to do with it--baking, cooking, grilling, EATING!  (We are going to be as big as houses one of these days-but not today).  We may decline to exercise or shop, but we will never decline a dinner invitation.  That also seems to be all we invite folks to do--come over for dinner :).  Last week we went over to one of my friend's home for PhillyCheesesteak Sandwiches that her husband has MASTERED!  It was very very tasty.  We enjoyed dinner and visiting with them.  Now we plan to have them over soon for something yummy.  We also had a dinner date with Seth's professor/mentor Zhao and her husband.  We invited them over for a 'Southern' Breakfast-grits, fried eggs, biscuits, and chip beef gravy.  Oh, how delicious it was.  When Seth's parents visited they brought Pear Honey (I had a difficult time sharing this!-It is one of my most favorite things that Seth's mother makes!).  We gave some to Zhao and Jonathan (her husband).

We have used our Cook cooler bag so much.  It is cute-handy-and I have enjoyed having it!

We've been busy with other things beside food-but I only want to blog about food-so that is that :).  Moving along.

July Fun Facts:

-Family Beach Week! Whoop Whoop!  Very excited about spending a whole week with my Fam-who I haven't seen in a while!  Seth and I-along with ALL of my family soooo look forward to this time and enjoy being together.  It is an annual tradition that we all LOVE.

-My lovely mother, my best pal, was born this month :).  Love you Mom and very glad that I get to spend your birthday driving down to the beach together!

-Seth's sister, Emily, was born during this hot month!  Have fun celebrating in Texas Em!

-A lot of my family were born this month. Henry, John Henry, Cara, Carsyn, Caroline, and Steve B.  We get to celebrate together!

-One of my best friends just got ENGAGED!  Soooooo very excited for A-Dub and Marty!  I played softball with Ashley-we were roommates in College our freshman year-she was a beautiful bridesmaid in my wedding-and will soon be a beautiful bride! :).

Ashley caught the bouquet at my wedding!

July also is Seth and my 11 month anniversary :).  He will be so thankful when we hit the 1 year mark!  We have been trying to plan our one year honeymoon-but we still don't know what is going to happen.  Right now we are planning on going to Park City.  We have even discussed using our Beach trip as our anniversary trip!

I better head out and start on my packing and beach preparation-we are trying to fit all our stuff in 2 carry-on bags...Ahhhhhh-Can this really happen?  It is going to be difficult!  I just wanted to do a quick blog to catch you up with life before we left.  Hope everyone has a great week!  Below is all the wonderful folks we are getting to spend a week with at the beach!

The Cook's :).