Welcome Friends and Family

 Welcome to our home!  I am finally done un-packing, for the most part and the decorations are some-what up, so I feel a little more comfortable showing you what our house looks like.  We love it and every day it feels more and more like home.  Now pictures don't do it justice, so if you want the "real" experience, you'll just have to come visit us!


There is a picture of the front of the house on one of the previous post.

 When you first walk in the front door this is what you see, on the right is the living room, then stairs going up stair and to the basement, and then you walk into the great room with the kitchen on your right.

 A glance at the our old living room couches that we've had since we've been married, it's time to retire them, but I don't know what I'd put in the room if I did.

Here is the view from the hallway looking at the front door.

 Another view of the front door from the dinning room.  And here is a little game for you, Jax wanted to be in most of the pictures so instead of playing "Where's Waldo,"  I give you, "Where's Jax."

 OK, so here is the kitchen, my favorite room in the house, I love that I have so many cupboards and room to cook!

 The view of the family room from the kitchen.

 Terrible glare from the window I know, but a look at my new couches and Clint.

 Family room again, just at different view.

The door on the left is my very small pantry which I don't love because it's small, the door that is open and to the right is the half bath/laundry room and the door in the middle goes out to the garage.

 1/2 bath/laundry room.  I REALLY dislike the laundry room because it's so small.  But so far we've made it work.

 OK, we've now gone upstairs.  Stairs are to your right, an empty room after the stairs, the bathroom straight ahead the guest room/office to the left of the bathroom.

 Just a typical bathroom.

Office/guest bed, I'm not sure how many guest we'll be having seeing as all of our family lives in Utah, so please come visit us so that we don't have a guest room for nothing!

 I forgot to take a picture of the view from the extra bathroom, but if I did it would led into master.  It is a huge room with a wall and fireplace separating the master bedroom from the master suite.  Well since we don't really need a master suite, I'm making it my craft room/sewing room/library/storage room/red chair room.  Here is the view of the room from the door way.

 Our library and wrapping paper corner.

 The fireplace and bookshelf wall, you can kind of see the master bed to the right of the fireplace.

I'm standing in the corner of the master looking towards the master suite, hallway and the stairs.

 The view of master from the bathroom.

 View of master from the door way.

 And the master bath, the tub is my favorite!  It's so nice having a soaker's tub!  The closet is behind me.

We also have an unfinished basement, but I didn't take pictures of that, I figured that if you've seen an unfinished basement, then you've seen one that looks like ours.

And there you have it.  We love it, feel like we got a great deal and it was move in ready, total bonus for us since we're not the most handy people.  The neighborhood seems like we'll fit right in, once we get to know people a little more.  So come see us if you're ever in the neighborhood!

Where did the Summer Go?

Excellent question, too bad I don't have a great answer.  We didn't go on any fancy fun camping adventures (if you know Clint, that's not a big surprise), we haven't done anything about adoption (had to get a house first), and we didn't win a million dollars (did anyone else?).  Our biggest excitement was of course buying a new house, so that's pretty big.  

As I was going through my pictures, we didn't do much of anything in June, it was a pretty mellow month.  It was kind of stressful wondering if we were going to get a house or not, you know since it was a short sale and the banks can be so finicky about silly little things, but everything ended up turning out.  The biggest thing that happened in June was Clint's promotion.  He was promoted to "Director of Project Management," or something like that, I just know that he gets a million emails, has two million meetings a day, and has a team of project managers that he oversees.  Sounds kind of boring to me, but he let me know that he has a "grown-up" job now, so the 9-5 days are over and that he has to do work stuff whenever it needs to be done.  This promotion has been a wonderful blessing and I couldn't be prouder of all of Clint's hard work.

July, again we dealt with the stress of a house, stress of packing and I had an amazing week at girls camp.  I'll have to do a post just about girls camp because I loved it so much!  The saddest part about moving has been leaving the young women and leaders I worked with in our old ward.  Such amazing people.

So onto August...

 This is pretty much what things looked like in August, boxes, boxes and more boxes - what a mess!  We moved into the house August 3rd and it seemed like we weren't home very much so it took forever to get things un-packed.

Two days after we moved in, there was a fire that started a few miles away from us.  We live right up against the mountain so unfortunately, I don't think this will be our last fire.  Please pray for us that we won't have to ever worry about a fire, but seeing as the state of Utah has been on fire this year, we'll just have to be prepared.

 

 On August 6th, I celebrated my 32nd Birthday.  It was a great day!  Clint took me to Texas Roadhouse for dinner and then the best part...

 

 ..Going to Sundance to see "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers."  It was the best birthday weekend EVER!  I got a house, couches and wonderful night with my amazing husband.

 The day after my birthday, I went to Cafe Rio with my friends Mindy and Shantel and guess who was there to wish me a happy birthday?  OK, so maybe Jef was there just to eat with his buddy, but I can pretend.  The three of us were too shy to say anything to him, so instead Mindy took an "accidental" photo of him, since we were sitting at the table next to him.  It made the night so much fun!

Aug 15-18 we went to San Diego for Clint's great grandmother "Momgie's" funeral.  It was a very quick trip, but we still had a good time.  More to come on that later.  Please don't judge me that I'm wearing the same outfit as I was on my birthday, how embarrassing!  :).

For over 2 years I have been having major pain in my feet, mostly my right. I just figured it was plantar faciitist and that I needed to do stretching, exercises and wear orthodontics, well after my softball game last week I could barely walk the pain was so bad.  I went to the pediatrics and he didn't have very good news for me.  I have a bone spur (it's kind of hard to see on the x-ray unless you know what you're looking for) that seems to be putting pressure on a nerve which is causing the pain.  He seems to think surgery is the best way to permanently fix the pain.  I'm not sure if I want to go through that, so we'll see what happens in the next few weeks and decide from there.

Lastly, I got a call from Salt Lake Community College on Monday saying they had a last minute opening for the dental hygiene program and that I could start my two year program the next day!  I was so shocked because I am not scheduled to start the program until fall of 2016.  The lady said that I had an hour and a half to think about it and get back to her as soon as I could.  I'm sure that I'll regret the decision I made sometime later in my life, but I just couldn't drop everything at the blink of an eye and start school.  There would be no way financially we could afford me to quit work  and I would have missed a week worth of school.  And the biggest reason, I was not mentally prepared to kill my brain like that.  It was the hardest decision to make, but we feel really good about it.  It was a VERY stressful hour and a half!

Well that sums things up in a nut shell, hopefully I'll get around to posting more post in the next few days, but life is busy as you all know so I'll get to it when I can.

Home Sweet Home

We are FINALLY home owners again!  It was quite a process dealing with a short sale, but it was well worth it.  We got a beautiful home that will hopefully bring us much joy for the next thousand years to come :).  Since it was a short sale, the seller's bank had a lot of interesting things we had to explain.  For instance, when we first applied for the loan, Clint was making X amount.  Well by the time we actually found the house and were approved by the seller's bank to buy the home, he had been given a raise of X amount.  So if you were the seller's bank, wouldn't you think, "Oh the buyer will defiantly be able to make the mortgage payment now that they are making more."  That's what I would think too, we thought that we would be making everyone's job a little easier by giving them this info, but guess what...Instead it just complicated things.  I got an email from our loan Processor Sheri (who by the way was amazing to work with, if you are looking for a loan processor, definitely check her out), who said that the bank was confused on why Clint got a raise.  I wanted to reply and just say he was awesome but I was afraid that would just screw things up, so instead we just mentioned that it was from his 6 month review and a promotion to a management position (which was all true).  I started joking around that I'd get real nervous when they asked me about the sucker I purchased 3 days ago and if I bit into the sucker or if I licked my way to the center, and if I did lick my way to the center, how many licks did it take.  Luckily, it didn't go that far.  Anyway, after climbing through hoops like that, we finally were able to close!  We got the keys late Tuesday night July 31, 2012.

It hasn't really sunk in quite yet, since I tried so hard not to get my heart into this house because of all of the uncertainties since it was a short sale.  I'm really excited now and I'm sure I'll be even more excited once we are unpacked.  You know how much fun moving is, right?  Well this will be our 5th move in the last 5 years so I definitely know that moving is NOT fun!  But we're getting really good at it!

Here is just a sneak peak of the house with Clint and Jax (Jax is the tiny dot that Clint is holding, and PS, this whole thing was meant to be because the title guys name was Jax, he has the same birthday as me, and it turns out, Clint and him are probably related!  Crazy!). I'll post more pictures once we have time to breath and can even think about such a thing, until then, if you're ever in the Ranches in Eagle Mountain Utah, stop on by and say hi! 

Miss Veenker 2012

Well it's hard to believe that last Friday night we had our 5th Miss Veenker pageant.  It was a success as always and all of the girls did such a great job, like always.  If you have no idea what the Miss Veenker pageant is, you can check out some of our other pageants Here, Here and Here (even though the last "here" is just one picture). I don't have a post from our first year, but I should do that because it's really fun to look back and see how much these girls have grown over the years.  One thing is for sure, it's time for new decorations!  If the girls didn't change so much from year to year, you would never know which year was which.  Last year we did it outside and it was so much fun, the pictures looked better, we had more space to move and the temperature was perfect.  This year we were going to try and have it outside again, but it had been raining all day and was slightly on the cold side, so inside again for us.

We had 3 categories, Talent, PJ, and Evening Gown.  We had a variety of talents this year, a magic trick, cheer routine, piano, violin, dance and a hula performance.  We had 3 new girls join us this year and lost one, apparently McKinsey is too old for this or something?  Who knows, we sure missed you though!  We had Jessica who is my cousin's daughter, Chloe who is another cousin's daughter and Boston who is my niece on Clint's side.  It is so fun to see all of them get along so well and be brave enough to perform in front of a group.  I just love them all!

 

The group after the crowning.

 We had a "licious" theme going on this year, so all of the awards ended in licious.  It makes it easier for the "judges" to come up with awards if we have some kind of theme.

 Afton did a piano number and had some fancy finger work going on throughout the night, even when the piano was no where in site.  During her modeling time, she showed us how those fingers could fly!  The cutest thing was the flip of her braids when she bowed after her piano performance.  So she got the "Miss Flip-o-licious" award.

 Ami is my sister-in-law Andrea's sister and has joined us for the pageant for the last 3 years!  It's crazy that Scott and Andrea have known each other that long.

She did an amazing Clogging routine that she choreographed herself!  She did such a great job and received the "Miss Clog-o-licious" title.

It was so much fun having Boston with us for the first time.  She doesn't have any cousins (yes, at all!), so it was fun having her join our family and being around so many girls. She did the most amazing magic trick!  We were all in awe of how she did it!  She received the
"Miss Magic-licious" title.

Brooklynn is now 13 and I am just amazed at what a marvelous young women she has turned into. Even though she is getting older, she still participates and doesn't complain (at least that I know of).  She was such a big help this year with helping me do hair.  She has the prettiest long hair, so she was awarded the title of,
"Miss Locks-o-licious"

Chloe is my cousin Andrea's daughter.  When I told Chloe about the pageant at one of our family dinners, she got super excited about it and wouldn't stop bugging her mom about when it was going to be.  I hope it lived up to her expectations because we loved having her with us.  She did a wonderful Hula Hoop routine and just when we thought she was going to loose the hula hoop, she amazed us all by keeping it up, even when it was around her thighs!  She was crowned 

"Miss Hula-licious."

Hailey had a rough night and only made it through the talent and PJ portion of the night.  But she still did a great job.  She played her violin and amazed us all with the progress she's made in the last year. If you look REALLY closely, you can see that she is wearing Tinkerbell pajamas, that earned her the title of 

"Miss fairy-licous."

Jessica is my cousin Richards daughter.  It was such a joy having her with us for the first time.  She gets along so well with all of the girls, and we love seeing her fun personality.  She did the cutest cheer dance!  She had music, moves and the cutest outfit.  She was crowned "Miss Cheer-o-licious"

Oh, Alexis, this girl can bring a smile to anyone's face!  Whether it's the funny comments she makes, her incredible dance moves, or her spunkiness coming out on the catwalk, she lights up the room and brings so much energy.  She received the

"Miss Spunk-a-licious" title.

Liberty always comes to the pageant with the funnest talent.  She is so creative, just like her mom  - a dance number from Liberty will never disappoint.  This year she performed the funnest dance.  She wore a cute summer outfit, and accessorized it with sunglasses and a beach ball.  She dance to the song "Summer Belongs to You" by Phineas and Ferb.  So cute!  She was crowned,

"Miss summa-licious."

 

Mya always does a great job on her talent, but this year she blew me out of the water with her violin skills!  You may or may not know that I grew up playing the violin and at one time I was an OK violinist (not so much any more, it's totally true what they say, if you don't keep up your talent, you're going to loose it!).  Mya played a violin number by Taylor Swift, and oh my goodness!  I don't think I could have ever done it.  I only played boring classical or church music.  I think I would have had a lot more fun practicing if I would have been smart like Mya and played songs that I liked.  She is amazing!  She was crowned,

"Miss Vi-o-licious."

After the crowning and pictures, I had the girls change back into their PJ's and we had a little dance.

Then came the good part, ice cream sundaes.

Most of the girls spent the night, but some some of them weren't able to stay, we sure missed them.  Before they fell asleep, we watched the movie Mr. Popper's Penguins. The girls seemed to enjoy it.  We didn't get to bed until after 11:00 and they were up bright and early by 7:00 the next morning.  I feel really bad saying this, but I'm sure glad I am the aunt and not the mom so that I didn't have to spend the day with them.  I know that I was ornery the next day, so I can only imagine what they were like ;).  Sorry mom's, but at least the girls had a good time!.

Thank you to all those who participated, the mom's who helped out with hair, make-up, getting the sundae stuff together and all that you do to make the pageant possible.  And a big thanks to my mom for helping me out with EVERYTHING.  She allows us to have the pageant at her house, helped me make breakfast in the morning and helped me make the sashes, plus so much more.  You're the best mom and I sure do love you!

Surprise!

Yes, I bet you are surprised to see a post from me!  I just wanted to check in just in case you were wondering if we are still alive, well...we are!  I know it's been 8 months since my last post and I need to be punished for that.  Hopefully one day I'll be able to fill you in on everything that has happened, but for now I'll just give a quick highlight of what's been going on.

During the summer we had a great time with my sister's family boating at Utah Lake.

In August we had the annual Miss Veenker Pageant

 

 During the fall I spent my Wednesday nights playing softball with Mom's Team.  95% of the team is family, hence the name, "Mom's Team"  My mom is our sponsor.

  

September 23 Clint turned 31!  Wow we're getting old!

 

In October my sister-in-law took some awesome adoption profile pictures for us.  Nothing has happened with the adoption process yet.  We will hopefully be moving in the next couple months from my parents and then we'll start the process.

On November 16, 2011 we celebrated our 10th anniversary.  We spent the entire day together!  We FINALLY got iPhones, went to lunch, went to the temple, and then went to dinner at The Copper Onion in SLC, if you have never been there, GO, it's so yummy!  It's been an amazing 10 years growing, moving, going through trials and enjoying life with each other.

In November (I think that's when it was) I was put into the Young Women as the secretary but was soon fired and asked to serve as the Mia Maid adviser.  I absolutely love this calling!

 

In January Clint and I took a quick one night, one day trip to Saint George Utah.  It was nice to get away.

 

We said goodbye to our first car in December.  The engine completely died on us so we said farewell.

 

 In February I went to Time Out For Women with my friend Shantel and sister-in-law Mariah.

 The end of February to the middle of March Clint went to India for 3 weeks for work!  It was the longest and quickest 3 weeks I've ever experienced.  Hopefully he never has to go again.  This is a picture of us Facetiming.  The only way we could talk.

 While Clint was in India I went to the cabin with my family to go snowmobiling.  Such a good time!

In March I attempted my first 5K.  It's a pretty bid deal for me.  I'm not a runner!  Even when I was on the basketball team I couldn't run for long distances.  I had to stop a few times to walk, but hopefully by the end of the summer I'll be a pro at the 5K.

And that about covers the major things.  I'm sure I am forgetting things, so if I am, I'll get to that next time.  We are doing good, Clint is enjoying being a project manager at Property Solutions, I applied for the Dental Hygiene program at SLCC, but it doesn't start till Fall of 2016, so we'll see if that still happens.  I have been trying to finish up some classes that I needed to take in order to get my associates, and by the end of April I'll be done with those!  It will be so nice to have a break from school for awhile.

Like I said earlier, we are hoping to buy a house in the next couple months so hopefully we'll be out of my parents hair and on our own again in the near future!  I can't wait!  And that about sums up our life.