I'm moving...again

I started writing this particular blog a week ago but I didn't get a chance to finish, so I'll try and keep it short but wanted you all to know that I haven't dropped off the face of the earth. Well the past couple of weeks have been flying by fast but that's a good thing. I think it helps a lot now that I am employed and have something to do during the day. We've just been trying to get stuff put together for the wedding in a couple of weeks. We did the invitations this week and had a bit of trouble along the way but we made it work. First of all, Jason's brother came up with a really great design for the invitations and we sent that off to Costco and picked them up on Tuesday. They cut a little off of the bottom which was kind of upsetting but what are you going to do when you are on a time crunch...That night I brought Eden over to Jason's house to help us stuff envelopes and Jason's roommate and brother chipped in which was nice. We though it would take us forever to burn through all of them but it only took about 30 minutes. I was impressed...it pays to have friends that can help you do such tedious things. We also had an idea to drip wax on to invitations and use a seal that we had found but we thought it would be a very long project to do that to all of them so we only used them on ones that we sent to family...I'm sorry if there are wax smears on the envelope...if it's any consolation, we had a fun time doing it. Jason stuck them in the mail on Friday morning so hopefully everyone receives theirs in the mail soon.

Leading up to Halloween there are a lot of haunted houses, haunted forests, haunted mazes. I had never been through one before and always wanted to. After our experience with Brittany and Clay at the haunted forest we wanted to go through another one pretty quickly and Jason's brother Daniel wanted to go too. So we find out that one of the top ten places in the country is right here in Salt Lake, naturally we wanted to go. It was called Castle of Chaos and Daniel called ahead to find out the price. He found out that if you pay a little extra they take you through additional rooms and then they also give you a poncho to wear...yep, as you walk through the people waiting to scare you will spray you with "blood", "snot", and "vomit". How exciting! Don't worry, there was no way that I was going to go through that one. We decided to go with the cheaper one and while we waited in this huge line there was a lot of cussing, cigarette smoking, and pot smoking...not by us though, just wanted to put that in there. After the guy behind us in line lit up his cigarette we decided it was time to leave and find somewhere else to go. There was another haunted house a few streets down called Nightmare on 13th. We went in and the price was much better than the Castle of Chaos and not as long of a line. Since there were a lot of people you try and distance yourself so that when someone jumps out at you, you don't ruin the surprise for the next person. This was a little difficult at times but it was fun. There were people dressed up in costumes just waiting around every corner to scare you. The first room you entered into there was a stage and things would pop out and show pieces from every scary movie. The part that scared me was they showed the video from "The Ring" and Samara came out of the well and then all of a sudden she was standing in front of the TV and then next thing you know she was flying over our heads, it scared me enough that I grabbed onto both Jason and Daniel. It was a lot of fun and I look forward to doing it again next year. Jason and I went to Lagoon last Friday for Frightmares. They have the places decked out for Halloween and have a few haunted places...ok, they aren't haunted but it was still pretty cool. In some of them you had to wear 3-D glasses and things on the wall would jump out at you. It was fun but a little too cold to be standing in lines all night.

The past month Jason and I have been trying to find a place to live when we get married. First we tried Sky Harbor and decided that it was too far away and much too small for our needs. Then we tried to get into Alta Pines which was perfect but they couldn't get us in until December 15. So we went with the first places we saw and really liked. It's called Legacy Court and we really like it, it's 710 square feet and just down the street from where I work. We went in two weeks ago to turn in our applications and they had a place ready to move in as soon as possible and they would knock $50 off the rent because the tenants before had stained the carpet, the vinyl in the kitchen around the sink, and stained the carpet in the bedroom. Seriously, it's not that bad but if they are wanting to take money off our rent I'm fine with that, we pay $625 a month and all utilities paid except for power. We were originally going to move stuff in on November 15 since that would be the weekend before we got married but my roommates already found someone to move into my space by November 1. I'll be honest, I wasn't too happy about that but then once I got talking to family and Jason I figured it would be cheaper this way. I will only have to pay one rent payment for the month of November instead of 2 and right now I really need to save my money. So I'm moving stuff in today, Jason is at work right now but I've got most everything packed up and ready to go when he gets off work. Daniel will help us move tonight after he gets off work and can bring the truck with him. I'll let you know how the move goes but I wanted to post pictures of what the place looks like now so you can get an idea.

This is the front entrance of the apartment. The kitchen has lots of storage and there is a pantry to the left of the fridge.

Another picture of the kitchen, you can see the stain on the floor from the previous tenants rug.

This is a really dark picture for some reason but this shows from the kitchen looking into the living room. The coat closet to the right of the door and to the right of that is our balcony.

A picture of the balcony taken from the storage closet outside, it's not huge but we could probably fit a few chairs on it.

The pantry, it's huge and I don't know how we're going to fill it.

The bathroom, but then again you probably guessed that.

The towel closet in between the bathroom and the bedroom.

The bedroom, it's pretty big but wait until you see.....

The huge walk-in-closet, we're thinking we might put our computer in there or something, it's big enough.

I am a slacker...

I just have to say that these past two weeks have really flown by, I didn't even realize that I had been a slacker and didn't write anything on my blog. I hope that you all can forgive me. Jason and I had engagement photos taken, his brother Daniel did them and did some really amazing things. Here are a few of them, if anyone is interested his website is: http://www.thruthelensphotography-thruthelens.blogspot.com/

Basically, I have just been working and finally making some money instead of spending it. I have to tell you that it feels pretty good to be getting a paycheck again. However, I'm starting to think that maybe I should have asked for more money since I am basically running this place...ok not really, but sometimes it feels that way. I sit behind the front desk and answer telephone calls, greet job applicants, get them started on the application, once they are done I have to enter the application and other information into the computer. Then I have to get them ready for an interview with a staffing consultant. Sometimes the whole process takes about 1.5-2 hours to complete, but in between that I am filing, verifying employment, and verifying that people are legal to work in the US. Yep, it's a busy job and I don't get to take many breaks, when I do get to it's sitting at the front desk answering phone calls and completing my online training.

First off, while I am typing this blog I am becoming increasingly annoyed at my laptop computer because my hand brushes against the mouse while I am typing and it moves the cursor to another area on the screen and starts typing there...it's just really annoying, I probably could have been done now if it weren't for having to go back and delete what I wrote and place it elsewhere. AND yes, I know that I can cut and paste.

Mom and Dad came out last weekend for General Conference and it was really great seeing them again. Friday night Jason and I drove up to Salt Lake City to pick them at the hotel that my Uncle Joe and Aunt Kelly were staying at and drove them down to Orem where they would be staying with my sister Brittany. When we got there Brittany, who is pregnant, had to be taken to the hospital since she had had a fever all day. You can read more about it on her blog if you want but while they were gone Jason, Dad and I watched TV before deciding to buy stuff for our ANNUAL GENERAL CONFERENCE BREAKFAST (Thanks to Kevin and Nicole for starting this tradition!) We waited a l ittle while at Brittany's house just in case they came back and could tell us what happened but at Brittany's apartment complex they put a boot on your car if you don't have a permit to park there overnight and it was getting close to midnight which is usually when they do the booting.

Saturday morning Jason came to pick me up and we headed back down to Orem to watch General Conference and to start making breakfast. After the first session of Conference Mom, Dad, Brittany and I took off for Wal-Mart and the Distribution Center for a few items. It was funny though at the Distribution Center because when we had to sustain people everyone would stop what they were doing and raise their hand and then they would go back to what they were doing before. Even during the prayer everyone would stop where they were and close their eyes and fold their arms. I mean, where else would you see that? After that session Dad took us all to Applebees for dinner and that was great! And then the boys took off for Priesthood session while Mom, Brittany and I stayed home and watched Sleepless in Seattle. Then on Sunday morning we had tickets to the Sunday morning session with my family and ended up walking 4 blocks in the pouring down rain...I didn't even think about bringing an umbrella with me. It was a great session and got to meet up with the Zimmer's and Woodley's again. Then we walked back to Clay and Brittany's car for lunch, they had brought us all sandwiches. We went to the afternoon session in tthe Joseph Smith Memorial Building for the afternoon session and the seats were more comfortable too. After that I said goodbye to Mom & Dad, but only for a month.

On Thursday night Brittany, Clay, Jason and I went to the Haunted Forest in American Fork and it was a lot of fun. Brittany took pictures and I'll post some of them in a minute but I have to say I had never been through a haunted maze before but I'd love to go to another one. When we first walked in there was someone dressed up like Michael Myers from the Halloween movies and he went right up to Brittany and tried to scare her but then he realized he had easier targets in the girls standing across from us. I was lucky to have Jason there because he would walk first in line and look around if there were any people standing around waiting to scare us and I realized that if I kept pace with him and sidled up to his right side and walked by nonchalantly that the people didn't even know I was there. That only worked sometimes though. When we walked through pitch black places Brittany would grab onto my arm and then I'd feel a tightening on my other arm only to notice when we hit light again that it was Clay. It was a lot of fun and lucky to have made it out alive. Jason hit his head a few times on low ceilings but I think he'll be ok. I will admit that I screamed twice and I didn't mean to but I got scared ok... One time we were walking through and "Freddy Krueger" hit a barrel of some sort and it made a loud bang that scared me and I actually stabbed Jason in the hand with my fingernail (don't worry, I didn't cause permanent damage). All in all it was a great night. Last night (Friday) we were going to go to Frightmares at Lagoon but after eating dinner we looked up and there were thick rain clouds heading that direction and it was freezing cold outside so we decided to wait until next week or the week after when we can go through again. Hopefully the weather will be better then and then we won't mind standing in line that long. Well I guess that is all that I have for now, I'll end it with pictures that Brittany took. Love you all,