2011 in Review

When I think back to how my life was a year ago, I can hardly believe how much has happened since then. 2010 was a really hard year for me and I had high hopes for 2011. Lucky for me, 2011 certainly delivered a great year...actually the best year of my life. And I totally mean that. It has been the best year of my life! Scott came home from his mission just two weeks before the start of the new year and I remember every moment from that day like it was yesterday. I was so excited for him to be home and see what the future held for each of us. Before he was home I was totally nervous and had no idea what to expect but the moment I saw him at the airport I just knew I was going to marry him. Ya I'm crazy, maybe.

So 2011 was cray cray crazy.



January: Scott had been home for like a month and we had just started getting back into the swing of things. I was loving having him home and falling in love all over again. Then he accepted a job painting various LDS temples for our church around the U.S. As in, he had to travel. Away from me. I was devastated, but also supportive. It was such an amazing opportunity for him to be able to spend that time working in the temples and it was also great money.

February: His first job was on the San Diego temple and he spent about 8 weeks there. Once he was finished he came home and on February 26 we were engaged. One of the best days of my life!! It was totally unexpected and the best surprise of my life. When we talked about getting engaged we said sometime around April or May, so he definitely had me surprised. Best surprise ever.

March: wedding planning began full force!

June: Scott was now working in Chicago and North Carolina. We had not seen each others in weeks and it was so so hard. Wedding parties also started. My best friends and family threw me an awesome bridal shower and made a slideshow that still moves me to tears.

July: Crazy but most fun month ever!! Traveled to Vegas for my last girls trip as a single woman. It was beyond fun! Stayed at the Cosmo and ate delicious meals and danced the nights away at TAO. Came home for a very sexy lingerie shower, went through the Temple for the first time, and we were finally married July 30th. That was the best day of my life. I woke up with so many emotions. Obviously stressed about the 200 plus people I was about to see and greet, but mostly just content that I was finally marrying Scott. I wanted this since I was 16 and finally there was no more waiting.

August: honeymooned in Hawaii. Best week of my life without a doubt.

September: brought home our furry baby who is very much part of our family now.

October: Went to Utah for Conference.

November: Celebrated or first Thanksgiving being married and the first we've spent together in 3 years! And Scott's 23rd birthday. Old man.

December: lots of holiday fun! First Christmas and traveled to Az and Tx to visit family.


It's been a great year and we're excited for 2012!

Vacancy.com Scholarship Entry

I'm not even going to be shy about this. Something crazy happens when you're 22, in college, and get married... you become poor!! Like, how are we going to buy toilet paper poor. So, I have been applying for different scholarships and by applying I mean I started today. Lucky for me I found this fun one!! Vacancy.com is giving away a $500 scholarship to someone who blogs about their ideal apartment in their ideal location. And they said to be creative and have fun, so that, I am. Here goes nothing...P.S pick me so I can buy toilet paper and textbooks.

My ideal location would be good 'ol TEXAS!! Git R Done, yee haw, save a horse and ride a cowboy. And I would love to live in these lovely apartments...  http://www.vacancy.com/texas/houston-apartments/mirabella-apartments . This is a gorgeous property! It is affordable. They advertise one bedroom apartments starting at $699!! I'm not going to say how much people in Orange County pay for a one bedroom, ok I am... friggen over a thousand bucks!! Not to mention everything you get for $699 that you don't get in Orange County. Here at Mirabella Apartments they have covered parking and it is a gated community, so you can park and walk to your home feeling safe!

They have a gorgeous 24 hour fitness center, see below. I need this because marriage not only makes you poor, but also fat. It's honestly a travesty. I mean, you're so in love that all you want to do is make your cute husband good meals like McDonald's and Panda Express and cuddle all day but you're poor so you cant afford a gym pass and then you get fat.

It also has this sweet swimming pool!! Who wouldn't love to just jump right in to that beauty on a hot summer day? Fully clothed of course. I can just picture myself doing canon balls into that pool.

And this wonderful play area? Hello fun!!! I will be pushing my husband off, I mean down, that slide the day we move in.

Mirabella apartments also has high speed Internet which is fantastic so I can continue blogging for all my wonderful readers. Which is probably only my mom. Also fantastic for school work because I love school and that is why I need this scholarship!!

There is also laundry facilities on site for my husband to do laundry. Because he is that great, no joke.

And last, but certainly not least, they are pet friendly! And this guy must come with us.

Why Texas you ask? Well, have you seen Friday Night Lights? So much pride in that state! And football. My husband loves football. He would marry it if it was legal, luckily it's not in case you were wondering. Also, cow tipping. I've never been but if I lived in Texas I would go. And Nasa. Who wouldn't love to see space ships all the time? I know I would. And because duh, everything is bigger in Texas. Or is it better? I don't know, I'll have to google that.

So pick me. Because I am a 22 year old college student who is just trying to be a great wife and an excellent student and for real college is expensive. I wasn't kidding about the toilet paper thing.

** photos courtesy of vacancy.com

Hi, We're Obsessed with our Cat

I'm not even embarrassed to post. Judge me not.


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Two Month Deets

(this post is late)

Today marked two months of marriage! Though that may seem small to most, I'm pretty excited about it. Mostly excited because these months have been the best of my life and I'm not sick of Scott yet (and hopefully never will be, of course)! Scott and I have learned SO much about each other in this short month and I know we will continue to learn more each day, but marriage is definitely a whole new ball game. While we are having so much fun and loving every minute of it, there's also new stresses I never thought about before we were married. Things like if he ate breakfast, if he had lunch and what he had for lunch, if he has clean underwear and work clothes, if I wake him up in the middle of the night because I pee like every hour, if i remembered to flush the toilet... I never worried about any of that stuff when we were dating. Plus the typical money stress that every young couple faces and finding an appropriate budget. Scott is for sure the saver and I am the spender so we're finding the balance and learning what we believe to be "wants" and "needs".

Some of my favorite advice we were given before the wedding was to "just chill." The dishes may not always get done, you may not know how you're going to pay your bills next month, someone might be in a bad mood and hurt your feelings, but stressing out won't solve any of it. Work hard and just chill. I love that and when I feel my blood pressure rising, I try and remember that.

The other favorite advice was to plan vacations. Whether it's a day trip, weekend or week vacation it's important for the couple to get out just the two of you. It's fun to save for a trip and plan it and the time you spend together is more enjoyed when you have worked together to get there. Our next trip is TBD but we are workin on it :)

These past months my favorite things we've learned about each other...

- scott does not wake up to his alarm. I wake up to it, then wake him up to turn it off. He falls back asleep and I wake him up again 30 minutes later in a panic that he's late to work.

- the first thing he does when he walks in after work or church is strip down to his underwear.

- i am more of a clean freak then I ever imagined. I'm much happier when the house is clean and smells of Lysol.

- we are still working on the toilet seat thing.

- there are only two of us, yet we never have any clean cups! Someone in this house has a cup problem, and it is not me.

- we got a cat. His name is Urban (like Keith Urban) and he is the most precious and annoying thing ever.

- it takes me like an hour after Scott falls asleep, to fall asleep most nights. I don't know why, but it drives me nuts!

- we LOVE our life, just the two of us. No kids. Just us and our cat. Usually every Sunday after church we both say something along the lines of how we love our selfish lives. Selfish meaning we don't have kids and as a couple we can literally do whatever we want, whenever we want. We can wake up and get ready really fast for church, then come home and stuff our faces and take a 3 hour nap just to wake up and lounge around in our underwear. If we had kids, this would not work :) Someday I want my little red headed babies, but not today.

And those are the deets!

Love,
Mrs. Douglas

Favorites

There are so many other things I could be doing this AM: laundry, dishes, SHOWER, homework, depositing laundry quarters and going over my weekly list from my boss. Instead, I am sitting on my couch in my pjs watching my kitten, Urban, act like a crazy fool with a pen on the floor. Life is good.

I have a post somewhere that I saved but never posted on our one month of marriage bliss, but today I will post on my favorite useful household items. Since getting married and having an apartment that is completely mine...er, ours actually, I have learned that I like to keep my house very clean (very as in no clutter, I'm not that much of a clean freak to be honest), I like my bed made in the morning which is seriously insane in the membrane because I have never once made my bed as a little girl, middle school girl, high school girl, college girl...never! Basically I just like a calm, clean, happy house. This could be stemmed from childhood, but I won't get into that. HA!

Without further ado, my favorite products!

1. These things are amazing! Kind of costly if you use multiple a day like I do, but they smell so great and disinfect.

.2. We got something similar to this for a wedding present and I love it. My hands never have to touch the creepy, dirty dishes and I am a compulsive soap user so this saves a ton of soap because it dispenses it self

3. These air wick plug ins. I just bought pumpkin pie and my living room and bedroom smell like Halloween. It's real nice.

4. Down Comforter. If you don't have a down comforter, you need one. You just do. Your sleeps will improve by the millions. It's like sleeping in a marshmallow. Like, I wake up and I think I am in a marshmallow. Then I roll over and see Scott and come back to earth.

5. Chevron Rug. You don't need a chevron rug, but I do love mine. I wanted each room in our house to feel different. I wanted the kitchen to be happy and bright, our bedroom to be soft and romantic and the living room to be kind of funky. This adds just enough pop of funky.

And that is all I care to share at the moment. Good day.

Viva Las Vegas

Vegas traffic blows and I need to take my mind off of Scott's road rage or I'm going to have heart failure.

Friday after work we packed our bags and headed to Vegas for the weekend for a wedding. One of Scott's good friend from his mission was married Saturday and Scott was lucky enough to be a groomsmen. The wedding was so beautiful and fun and it was great meeting some people that Scott has been talking about forever. I also got to hear tons of mission stories and it made me so happy that Scott has such great memories from his mission and has made lasting friendships with the guys he served with for two years. A mission is an incredible sacrifice but an even more incredible blessing and I am grateful for a husband who loved his mission and served faithfully.




Here we are outside of the Vegas temple.




Scott and some mission friends. They were so cute with each other all day, it melted my heart.

Sunday we dedicated the day to exploring the Las Vegas strip! This was so fun for me because it was Scott's first time on the strip so I took him to all the hotels and tourist spots. The first stop was a vegas buffet and none other then Wicked Spoon at the Cosmopolitan. If you're ever in Vegas and want the biggest bang for your buck, eat here and eat extra for me. And try not to drool too much over the deliciousness you will experience in your mouth. Eat so much you want to vomit, you won't regret it. That's how much I love this buffet. Scott and I loosened our pants and dove right in. In Scott's words, "I take buffets as a personal challenge" and that he does. Ok I'm hungry now.

Our next stop was the Mandalay Bay to see the shark reef exhibit, per Scott's request. I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty disappointing. You pay 20 bucks to see some gold fish and maybe 3 sharks.













After feeling sad about not seeing many sharks we went to the MGM hotel to see some lions and then to walk the strip more and see the MnM and Coke stores, my favorite!

















At the Coke store we tried this float platter where you get to try 8 different ice cream floats in different coke flavors. My favorite was the Cherry Coke float- super yummy!




And here we are sitting in traffic. Someone want to send their private jet to just come get us? Thanks!

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Oh hey, we're married!

There is so much to blog about! Number 1 being our wedding day, and two being the most amazing week of our lives... The honeymoon in Kauai. But we don't have internet yet or pictures uploaded so this post is about life after the honeymoon! And a few pics to give you a taste of what our apartment looks like.





This is our kitchen....














And living room.

No pics on my phone of our bedroom or dining area, and we have a spare bedroom but it's currently empty until we can afford to furnish it.

So decorating is coming along slowly but good! I wish I had a million dollars so I could just do everything I want right away without any type of budget but I cannot. However, we have been extremely blessed with all that we have already and I couldn't be happier.

Life after the honeymoon has been great! I used to think it was so annoying listening to newly married people talk about marriage. They all sounded too cheesy "marriage is soooooo fun, I just LOVE my husband soooooooo much" but it really has been fun. Each week I tell Scott, "2 weeks and still goin strong!" (or whatever week we're on) My favorite moments so far are laying in bed at night, staying up late and talking. Scott and I never lived together prior to marriage so this is all new stuff for us. Bed time is the best with him. And we don't have cable or Internet yet so there's lots of talk time.

I'm working on being a better homemaker and making dinner but i definitely have a long road ahead of me. I make Scott's lunches, I'm not sure he even cares though. I think he lets me because he lets me because he knows it makes me happy. Last Sunday was our first week at our new ward! I'm excited to be at a new ward with a fresh start and dive right in. I'm positive we are the youngest couple in the ward. Everyone in relief society was about 50 and they all called me "the young bride" which was cute.

This weekend we are headed to Vegas for a wedding. One of Scott's bffs from his mission is getting married so I'm very excited to meet some mission friends and to have a weekend away with my husband. Then we get back and school starts :( Such is life.


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Changes

Exactly two weeks to the day that I will be married to my handsome man. I am so excited, my heart and my stomach have constant butterflies. I am happy to be marrying Scott, but dude I'm nervous too! I've never been married before. I don't know how to be a bride, or a wife! I mask my complete excitement with an "everything is fine, I'm not stressed or nervous at all" look on my face. But on the inside I'm feeling "what if none of the rentals show up and I have to have a picnic style wedding?" or "what if the BBQ tastes like butt and no one likes it?" and "what if I straight up vomit during the ring ceremony and my MOH has to stand in my place while I cry in the bathroom?" All of those things could happen, but I'm hoping they won't.

I'm excited to be married. Marrying Scott has been on my mind since I was 16. I filled out our marriage license application and when I wrote "Douglas" under future last name, it felt right. The two of us have literally grown up together but even though we've been dating for 6 years and I am or certain in every way that he is that man I want to spend forever with, I can't help but feel slightly sad to end this chapter of my life as a young, single (as in not married) girl. I've had a few friends get married and none of them have expressed this, so maybe I'm crazy. Maybe I'm selfish. But regardless of the fact that I feel ready and happy to be married, I am sad about some things that will change.

- Girls trips with my bffs. These will still occur, I will make sure of it but now I will have a husband to take care of and love and it won't be as convenient to just take off for the week.

- Bills to pay! I've supported myself for a few years now but every now and then I ask my parents for a little assistance. Not anymore :( My mom even asked for her house key back, and I was seriously offended.

- Late nights with the girls and my bestest Anne. So many times we all don't get off work until 9 or 10 at night and will meet up for Starbucks or fro yo and sit at someones house and just lounge and talk. I live 30 minutes away now and I'll be married. I can't just take off every night at 10 and get home at 3am.

- Shopping. I love to shop. And Scott knows this as he installed our closets and hung up all my clothes and bought me a shoe rack. He also pointed out we have 5 giant closets in our apartment and I have stuff in every single one. No longer can I just buy what I want, when I want. Which is actually probably a good thing.

Maybe this all sounds silly, but I will miss all of it. It's not like Scott will care if I hang out with my friends or I want to shop very now and then, but it will be different because it's no longer just myself I have to worry about.

I cherish the moments I have with my best friends and I know our friendship will be just as strong when I am married but I will always remember my young, single days getting crazy in the clubs, sipping on a red bull and yelling at taxi drivers.

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Thoughts in an Empty Apartment

This week I moved into what will be mine and Scott's first hone together. It's a cute little apartment and I have the most amazing opportunity to be the apartment complex new resident manager and Scott will be the new maintenance man on site. We feel incredibly blessed for this opportunity but I'll get Ito that in another post. Tonight I'm thinking about life when I'm married... In one month from today!!!

While I am super excited for my wedding, and our exciting honeymoon in Kauai (bow chicka bow wow...) I am mostly excited to come home and just be married to my hot man. Scott and I have been apart for the majority of our dating life between college, mission, and now he's pretty much been gone since we got engaged in February. Living together and seeing each other every day is going to be a whole new experience and I can't wait!! I can't wait to sleep next to him every night, I can't wait for him to make me breakfast in bed and clean the house :) just kidding. But really, I cant wait for dinners at home together, late night movies on the couch, reading scriptures together and going to a family ward as husband and wife. Growing and learning together. That is what I am excited for. As I sit here in my empty living room with boxes surrounding me I just keep thinking of the life we are building. Someday this living room won't be empty. It will have little chubby babies (hopefully with red hair like Scott) crawling on the floor. My life is changing drastically right before my eyes and I am equal parts ecstatic to start this new journey but sad to leave behind the single girl who only has herself to worry about. Here's to a new step in life.

For you're enjoyment, some random iPhone pics...



Living room.



I'm not going to boast and say I put this together myself... But I put this together myself. That's a California king. I'm five foot nothin. Enough said.




My amazing find at bed bath and beyond. 5 dollars. Going on our couch.

Over and out.

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Feeling Blessed

I thought I would write a post of gratitude to everyone who has helped and who is helping with the wedding and helping Scott and I prepare for marriage. Big or small, we appreciate every gesture of sacrifice that has been put towards the wedding and our life. We love you all!!

Before getting engaged and throwing myself into planning I didn't realize how much work it was. I also didn't realize how much help we would have and how most people really do want to help. For starters, both of our parents are amazing. They are helping us in many ways to make our wedding special and to help us on our feet when we are first married. We are so grateful for them!

Last week Scott's grandparents took me shopping for dishes. When we arrived at the mall I had full intentions of only leaving with dishes, but by the time we left I had all of our pots and pans, dishes, and lots of kitchen gadgets. I felt so spoiled and so lucky that his grandparents were generous enough to do that.

My MOH and bridesmaids are awesome. Anne, my MOH has gone above and beyond what any other MOH would do. She frequently calls and emails my mom asking of ways to help. Rarely do I have to ask her for help because she's always on top of it before me. She sent out the cutest bridal shower invite ever! She also delegates tasks to the other girls so I really never have to do much. I am blessed beyond measure to have the girlfriends that I do. They are all so great and I love them!

The list could go on and on. We have a lot of people who love and care for us and we truly are grateful for each of you.


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Meet the Newlyweds

I know we're not married yet, but we will be in less than 3 months :) Although most of my readers (if I even have any) probably know us already, I thought it might be fun to do a little background on both of us. And the fun part is, Scott never reads this blog and probably never will so I can literally write whatever I want about him...HA!

I'll start with this man...isn't he handsome?

Scott was born and raised in Southern California. He's the youngest of his family, and he acts like it too :)

- He loves sports, specifically football but will watch and play any sport.
- He loves Country music, but will also listen to Flogging Molly and MxPx. Fun fact: we went to an MxPx concert in high school and met the lead singer.
- He has no idea who Justin Bieber is. I know, it's embarrassing.
- He loves fart jokes and all bathroom jokes. He has a farting app on his phone and will laugh at the different sounds for-ever.
- Pretty much won't say a mean thing about anyone.
- Is the most laid-back person I know. He is constantly telling me to relax.
- loves to surprise me but always ends up telling me the surprise early because he gets too excited. It's cute.
- every time I tell him an idea or the wedding, or our future home he looks at me like I'm crazy and says "ok". Why can't he see my vision!?
- spelling isn't his strong suit but give him any math equation and he can solve it in his head. He did my math homework in high school and community college!!
- loves to cook and I am blessed for that because I hate cooking.



Now ME:



- Love Diet Coke, more then air.
- I have been a nanny for 4 years. Love it & hate it, but mostly love it.
- born in Phoenix, AZ. Moves to southern CA when I was about 7 and have lived here since.
- Love Country music but like to shake my butt to good gangster rap.
- Next to Scott, I have the 4 best girl friends a girl could ask for. We are a riot together. Loud and obnoxious, but genuine and fun... We are inseparable.
- I am constantly trying new diets. I have been successful on weight watchers and I just started the Raw diet.
- I used to love working out and going to the gym. Hopefully I'll get into a good routine again.
- I'm excited to be a wife!!




Together we are excited to be married and start this new journey of our life. Can't wait for July 30th!!

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My Dress Ain't White

Planning a wedding is so much fun. I spend hours a week looking at wedding blogs and borrowing ideas to use in my own. I truly am planning my dream wedding. It's going to be fun, simple but with a lot of DIY details to make it special, and it is going to be 100% what Scott and I want. I've always been the people pleaser. The girl who sacrifices and settles to make those around her happy. I will always be that person, it's in my nature (I got it from my mama, along with her booty) and I'm fine with that. I like making people happy! But my wedding? This I only get to do once, and the only people I want to please are myself and my handsome groom. So, since I've gotten a lot of grief and opinions I just want to forewarn you on a few things...

- My dress ain't white! It's "champaign." I realize it's tradition for the virgin bride to wear white on her wedding day, but I'm not concerned about tradition. I know who I am, I know what I stand for and if someone honestly looks at me and thinks I've gotten down and dirty before the wedding because I'm not wearing white...well you honestly don't know me. I love my dress.

- The reception is in Pomona. GASP! We're asking people to drive 30 minutes out of their way to celebrate with us one day this year. The reception is going to be at Scott's grandparents house in their backyard and they have a gorgeous home. I've always wanted an outdoor summer wedding so it's perfect for us! If you have a complaint because that's too far from you and you would like to pay for us to have it at a location more convenient for you, contact me.

- The reception is in July and it may or may not be hot outside. True. Getting married sooner wasn't an option and I didn't want to wait until December to marry my man because then I may not be allowed to wear a white dress even if I wanted to...HA HA

- We are making all of the invites ourselves. Will it be a big task? Yes. Is it exactly what I want? Yes. I don't care if you open our invite and throw it in the trash. I love our invites and will look back in 20 years and still love them.

- We're not having wedding cake. We are having cupcakes and pie. I don't like wedding cake ad neither does Scott. So why serve something we won't eat but are paying for?

- Scott is planning a surprise honeymoon. He is letting me do 99% of the wedding so I thought I would give him the honors of the honeymoon. Neither of us have ever been anywhere so it won't be too hard to please me. I'm not worried about what he plans.

These are just a few of the comments I have received from people so I thought I'd share. Try to hear the humor in this post. Weddings clearly bring out the crazy in people.

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So We're Getting Married

This is my first post on this blog so it may be pretty boring, although I am not new to the blogging world. In fact, if you're reading this and you have
a blog then I have probably read your blog. I love blogs!! My dream is to become one of those bloggers who has like a million followers because the blog is so cute and creative, but in the meantime I'll just write about what I know. And currently that is love and life. Although mostly good, love ain't perfect and life definitely is not perfect so this blog will be about the ups and downs of our love and our life.

Being recently engaged, I have felt this great feeling of euphoria. I am happy. I am content. I am IN LOVE. Don't worry, this blog isn't going to be all lovey dovey where every post I rave about how great Scott is...just occasionally :) There are days when I can't get over how freaking lucky I am to have found such a great guy. A guy who willingly does my ten loads of laundry to his house and washes and folds all if it because I don't have a washer or dryer. A guy who looks at me and calls me hot on the days that I feel like I look like crap. A guy who makes me want to be better. He definitely got the short end of the stick and not just because I am 5 foot nothin.

The point is, I am so excited to be married to him. Sure we will experience trials, heck we already have just since being engaged. But we will go through the good an the bad holding hands.

I can't believe the boy I danced with when I was 15 and went home an wrote in my journal about is going to now be my husband. You never really know what the Lord has planned for you.





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