My New Skinny Jeans

One of my most embarrassing moments captured on film. 

New skinny jeans are awesome.

Pedicures are awesome.

Skinny jeans and pedicures are not awesome together.

Especially when you had a tough enough time getting them up over your calves for a pedicure and you LITERALLY cannot get them back down when you're done.

At one point I thought I was going to have to 

a) rip my brand new pants

b) amputate my leg because I had basically made a skinny-jean-tourniquet

Thankfully, two (yes, it took two) Asian ladies were kind enough to get their skinny fingers in what little space was between my pants and calves. It was hilarious and terrifying and I'm happy to say that my calves and jeans escaped unharmed. 

Cruising Cousins

In January we went on a cruise with Riley’s second cousins. That’s right. I said second cousins. They’re his dad’s cousin’s kids. I don’t even know my parent’s cousins, let alone their kids, so I think it's pretty awesome that they are so close. 

When I met Riley, I already knew his immediate family and I absolutely loved them. (In fact, two of my friends and I wanted to be Lymans so bad, we made a plan that each of us would marry the 3 oldest Lyman boys. I was supposed to marry Riley--obviously I followed through with my part of the plan--but I was the only one who did...) When I met his extended family before we got married--even though there were so many of them, and it was a little overwhelming--I loved them too. So when they invited us on a cruise almost 2 years ago, we were going to make it happen.

It was nice to have a warm break in the middle of January. There's seriously no better time to go on a cruise. There were 7 couples and even though there was a little bit of an age gap (us and Garrett and Kellie were the youngest there), it didn't seem like it at all. It was a good group...a really good group.

We did the Western Caribbean, and we went to Half Moon Cay, St. Thomas, Puerto Rico, and Grand Turk. Riley and I had only been on one cruise before (on our Honeymoon to Hawaii), and it was really great. But going with a group of people was SO MUCH FUN! We did almost everything together as a group and I loved every minute of it. Every night we played cards, tried out the shows (which were sooooo lame. Come on Carnival!), waited until they started playing good music at the club, and danced all night long. We were usually the only ones dancing in the club (if you can imagine 7 Mormon couples just cutting a rug), but there were a lot of other drunk people watching us. Creepy. When it would get too hot in the club, we'd start a dance party on the deck. One lady actually recognized us the next day at breakfast as the dancers from the deck party the night before.
Hey oh!
Dancing Reputation.
Dream come true (if any of you people from Jerusalem read this, you know how much I loooove dancing).

 I had heard that the food on Carnival isn't always good, but we thought it was great. There was one night at dinner when Riley couldn't decide what he wanted, so he literally ordered the entire menu. Appetizers and all. And he ate all of it. I have a hard time keeping him full at home, so I was glad he was getting enough to eat. We definitely got our money's worth...

These two were always sleeping on the hammock together. Good thing they're brothers....

Basketball-playing-model-twins

I just want to draw attention to Riley and Garrett's wardrobes. They BOTH bought white pants for the cruise (without talking to each other) and they stole Rodge's Hawaiian shirts. 

Scootering in Grand Turk

Tiff and Marie

Gangs all here!

You know we loved the magician

Clubbin'

Half Moon Cay, Bahamas

St. Thomas (Fran, remind me how much those yachts cost?)

The guy's favorite part: playing football on the beach.

Kel and I snorkeling in St. Thomas

Puerto Rico

I literally cannot say enough good things about these people. I'm lucky to be related to them. Love you guys!

Deer in Headlights

A few months ago, Riley and I saw a man on a bike get hit by a deer.

You heard me.

The man got hit by the deer.

We were driving on University Avenue when we saw a deer running across the street, so we slowed down. The deer was using the crosswalk (as most deer do) and ran right into the guy on the corner waiting to cross the street, knocking his bike onto the ground.

Easily one of the funniest things I've seen. Ever.

2013 was a good year

Okaaaaay. I'm the worst.

I haven't blogged in OVER a year. What is wrong with me?! I take plenty of pictures and we had a ton of fun in the past year, but I just never think to post anything on here.

Here's an update:

I graduated from BYU December 2012 (yikes! real world?)
I got "let go" from the BYU Upholstery Shop -- I can't have a student job if I'm not a student, they said.
I got a new job for a few months. Worst.
I quit said job and got a job in my field (which I LOVE)
I went on my first business trip (to Chicago, yo!)
I went to Girls Camp for the first time as a leader (Being a leader is soooo fun at Stake Camp. You don't have to do a dang thing. AKA drinking diet coke in our cabin while the girls are out hiking.)

Riley got a new job too. A guy in his home ward offered him a superintendent job which paid more AND he got a new phone and a monthly stipend for a truck (win, win, win)
He's getting closer to being done with school (sidenote: being graduated from college and married to someone in college is basically just like being back in college. I feel his pain! And his stresses stress. me. out. Graduation cannot come soon enough...)
He's working on his Real Estate License along with his bachelors in Construction Management.
He thinks he didn't ride his horse near enough this past year.
He became the cutest Elder's Quorum President you've ever seen.

We got a new nephew.
We ran a 5K (more of a feat for me that Riley. He got third in his age group. I finished.)
We took a trip to Zions.
We took a trip to California.
We're going to have a new sister in law in May!
We still manage the apartment complex in Provo. We love it and we hate it. We'd love to buy a house, but really, you can't pass up free rent, AND getting paid to take rent every month and fix stuff every once in a while.
Apple: When we leave, we'll have a hefty down payment for a house.
Lemon: Which means we'll be in Provo for a little while longer.

We are super busy all the time. With jobs and managing apartment complexes and callings, but we have a great life!

Riley thinks every man needs a gun to "protect his family" You can tell how I feel about it.

Most Prized Possession

Last night, I had a dream that some guy stole this beauty:

 It's my sewing machine that used to by my mom's, and I'm pretty sure it's older than I am. 

I woke up crying. 

CRYING.

I didn't think I was that attached to my 30-year-old machine, but then I remembered this video that Andrea and I made a couple of years ago:

Maybe I am.

That's my husband

Tonight I was working in our extra room and Riley was studying in the kitchen. I have my sewing machine set up next to the printer and I heard the printer start up. I thought he was just printing off slides, but this is what I saw when I looked at it:



   He makes me happy.

Halloween

Yes, I did make my costume out of pillowcase.
I was surprised  how long it was; it was the perfect fit!  

We had a pretty fun Halloween. Riley had an intramural soccer game that night; it was the first game in the tournament, and they're in the upper division, so we couldn't miss it. Plus they were already short 4 guys.  They didn't have any subs, so you could tell the team was tired about halfway into it. They lost, but its double -elimination, so they still have a shot. We'll see what happens at their game on Friday night...

After the game we went to Rodge and Mara's to get the rest of Riley's outfit (which is not really a costume because he wears them on days that are not Halloween) and we got to see Rodge's classic MJ costume and dance that goes along with it. I don't think the kids who come to the door think its funny to see this old guy dancing to MJ songs while he hands them candy, but believe me, it's REALLY funny. He's got the moves.

We went up to Sarah and Tim's house for the party after that, which was basically not a party anymore because everyone had gotten out of their costumes already and Eli was asleep, but it was still fun. The little kids (and Jo Jo) were excited to show us all of their candy (Rightly so. What little kid doesn't want to show you how much candy they got?) and they put their costumes back on so we could see how cute they were.

The girls. (Emmy was tired at this point.)