Sunday Dinner

Last Sunday I wanted to make a nicer dinner than usual. Our good friend was coming over and I wanted to make something other than the usual spaghetti or better yet frosted mini wheat's for dinner. So I decided to make this...

It was a lemon/garlic chicken and pasta that I found on pinterest. We made a nice green salad and corn to go with it. Oh and we also made garlic bread...

Yummy right? Other than the black bread, it was actually a pretty tasty dinner. I highly suggest it and it is SUPER easy to make.

Debt Free

Thank you to our tax returns this year, Jared and I were able to pay off the rest of our student loans and man it sure feels good. I actually took a picture of us paying it off and then decided it's probably not smart to put our account information online for all to see. We decided to use half of our tax return to be serious with and half of it to go toward a vacation this summer for our anniversary. And now that we are debt free I don't feel guilty what so over going on a nice vacation. We are thinking a cruise but we are just waiting for a good deal. Anyone have any good ideas for finding good vacation deals? I need all the secrets. If all else fails we'll probably just go to the airport and tell them to send us out on the next flight available and we'll see where we end up!

What we did this weekend

So I definitely forgot to bring my camera on our little weekend get away. I'm super bummed. I guess that means Jared and I will just have to do it again so I can take pictures :) We decided to spend a night up in Salt Lake to get away from Provo for a night. We left Friday afternoon and went straight to the Salt Lake Temple. It was my first time going to the SLC temple and it was absolutely GORGEOUS. I couldn't believe it. It was a very special experience. After the temple we went to the Cheesecake Factory. Their menu is seriously like a novel. Out of all of the things I could've gotten, I ended up getting a delicious burger. That's right folks....I got a BBQ bacon burger with fries. I was starving and I needed something hearty. We spent the night at comfort Inn. It was actually pretty nice.

On Saturday, we spent a couple hours at the gateway mall. They were celebrating the 10 year anniversary of the 2002 Salt Lake Olympics. They had actual athletes from the Olympic games and little demos of the different sports. We did a lot of shopping on Saturday which I can't complain about. Overall, it's been a wonderful weekend. It was nice to have a little break today from work and school. It's time to battle a new week.

V-Day

I am not a big fan of Valentines day to be honest. I think it's a sorry excuse to tell someone you love them.  I remember back in high school, I had a boyfriend who got me a teddy bear on valentines day and I ended up shoving it in my locker. That's how much I love it. And if we're going to get a holiday, I should at least get the day off right? I specifically asked Jared not to get me anything and all I wanted was to go out to dinner and see the vow. Overall it was a good night and  it gave us the excuse to go out to dinner. 

Does this picture look familiar? This was the picture Jared and I took last year on valentines day. We didn't take any pictures this year so I figured this would be good enough...probably because I wore the exact same shirt, the exact same jeans, the exact same coat....not to mention the exact same earrings and oh yah...I did my hair the exact same way.  I'm very original I know. Jared wore a blue striped shirt rather than a purple striped shirt instead. So, we pretty much looked the exact same this year :) 

We're off to spend the weekend in Salt Lake just for the heck of it and I'm looking forward to every minute of relaxing! Hopefully I remember to take pictures of that little get away.

Beware....Sappy

I know when I started this blog I said that I wasn't going to be too sappy about being married and how great my husband is but it's hard to not brag to the world about how you all missed out and how I scored...BIG TIME. I couldn't have asked for a better husband.

I remember my Dad telling me the night before my wedding, "You think you love him now, but just wait. You don't even know what love really is." Jared and I have only been married 7 months but it's amazing how much deeper your relationship gets over such a short amount of time. And yes, I know, we are experiencing the least of our troubles right now and my Dad will probably still tell me that I don't know what love really is but hey love has to start somewhere right?

A wise person once told me, "If single people knew what marriage was really like, they would be a lot more miserable than they already are." I would have to agree whole heartedly. Life is definitely not easy once you're married but for some reason it seems a little bit more bearable when you have someone standing by your side, especially when you have someone like Jared. He is truly one of a kind and every day I think, How did I get so lucky to deserve someone like him? He's definitely not perfect, nor am I, but he is perfect for me and that's all that I need.

All in all, I just have to say I have the best husband in the world. Not only is he smart, funny, athletic and spiritual,....he's just down right HOT and what more can a girl ask for?

Tender Mercies

The past few months have been some what of a whirlwind for me. I feel like I work constantly, which I actually don't mind. I really love my job and I love the people I work with. I really have nothing to complain about, I'm only taking 6 credits right now, working 30 hours a week and the rest is kind of undecided. But the past few weeks I've really noticed how much God is apart of our lives every day. He consistently gives us tender mercies on a daily basis and I would say that most of the time we don't even recognize them. Needless to say, I've had a couple experiences that have really strengthened my testimony of how much God is really aware of us and our needs.

This may be a very silly example but it really strengthened my faith. The other day Jared and I were doing laundry  and were literally one quarter short from completing a load (yes we have to use coin operated machines). We decided to go up to campus anyway and take our tests and then on the way home we could pick up some quarters from the bank. I kept thinking how awesome it would be if I just found one quarter on the ground on the way to campus. I will have you know that I stared at the ground the ENTIRE way to campus. I had total confidence that I would find a quarter. Nonetheless, we didn't find one on the way to our home from campus. It really wasn't a huge deal to go get more quarters but what an inconvenience right? Only ONE quarter short. We got home and decided that we were going to look under the machines in case a quarter had dropped. Sure enough...there was just one quarter sitting under the machine. Now you may say to yourself, "total coincidence." And what I have to say to that is, "I think not." In my eyes, it was definitely a tender mercy.

On a more serious note...As many of you know, I have applied for a full time job at my work and I just had my interview on Tuesday (Glad it's over). For the past few months, I don't think there has been one prayer that I haven't asked for help and confidence going into my interview. A few days before the interview as well as the day of, I pleaded, begged, and literally cried for help. As soon as the interview was over, I walked out and found myself saying,"I nailed it. I'm awesome." I immediately texted Jared, my mom, Dad, and my mother in-law to tell them how good I felt. A few minutes later I got in my car, and was immediately humbled. I recognized that I was not alone in that interview and I was definitely being guided by the Spirit. How often do we do that? We beg and plead and sometimes even cry for help and when we get our answer, we take all the credit for it. How prideful are we? I'm grateful that God sometimes has to humble us to teach us a lesson. And in my eyes, those lessons are little tender mercies.

Christmas Break

Jared and I had the opportunity to visit both of our families during our seriously needed winter break. We spent Christmas with my family and the week after Christmas with his. I unfortunately didn't take very many pictures. As this was our first holiday we spent together (minus thanksgiving) it was an eyeopening experience for us both to see how very different our definitions of "vacation" are. Christmas at the Bell home is filled with lots and lots of activities. This year there was a visit to the Santa Monica Pier, riding bikes along the beach in Santa Barbara, and kayaking in Ventura Harbor. Are you noticing a theme here?...they all revolved around the beach. I can't get enough of it.

Jared's family, on the other hand, likes to vacation by relaxing....A LOT of relaxing. They like to play a lot of basketball, but mostly like to stay inside and just veg. Which was actually a GREAT way to end our break before we started up with our busy lives of work and school. I usually don't do well vegging all day so I made sure to go on a run every morning to get my body going. I actually really didn't mind the vegging...and in Jared's defense there actually was SOME sort of activities...we did go to the movies to see the Muppets (Not my favorite...but I was never a muppets fan growing up) and we did get to go to a Pheonix Suns game! Merry Christmas to Jared :) Unfortunately it was a TERRIBLE game. Jared's man, Nash, did not do so hot. I am already not too fond of the guy (only because I think he is ugly) so the fact that I could've probably played better than he did that night only confirmed my dislike for him.

Needless to say, There is nothing weird about the way our families vacation....they're just different :)