Third Stop: England

We took a train from Scotland into England. First, we stopped in Preston to see the LDS temple there. It’s a newer temple and looked really pretty!

Then we hopped back on the train and a few hours later, we were in London!

We went to Oxford, where we got to see Christ Church. {If you’re a Harry Potter fan, you might recognize it… as the Dining Hall!}

We also saw Shakespeare’s birthplace.

And we went to Warwick Castle.

And I pretended to shoot my imaginary bow and arrow from the castle turret… but just ended up looking like a big dork!

I don’t really know which King Henry was which, but the one that had six wives… I pretended to be his seventh…

And these were just proof that M and I are a perfect match for each other…

Then we hit up all the London tourist attractions… on a double-decker red bus!

We also got to cruise along the Thames.

I don’t particularly love tourist attractions but I’m glad we can say we saw the main sites. My favorite part of traveling is just seeing the lifestyles of the people, and I particularly loved seeing the silly street performers, like this guy that made five random guys dance to the 1978 classic YMCA…

We also got to see the houses M lived in while growing up in Southgate and even the soccer fields at his school.

But the best part of our visit to London occurred on our last day there… the Tottenham v. Fulham match!

It great because we won but also because there was such a fantastic atmosphere! M has always raved about how amazing English soccer fans but I never understood… until I experienced it for myself. It was so much fun!

Second Stop: Scotland

Neither of us had ever been to Scotland, so we decided we wanted to add it into our trip. We were only able to squeeze in one day, so we decided we’d spend that day in Edinburgh. And we loved it!

Yes, yes, we saw a few guys in kilts, but surprisingly fewer than I had been anticipating.

I loved the architecture of the buildings and the quaint feeling of the streets. The city has a unique charm to it!

Another thing that was fascinating to me was the blackened buildings, a blackness that doesn’t wash off the buildings. It comes from the smoke from all the chimneys years and years ago.

Finally, don’t forget the UK’s famous red phone booths.

First Stop: Ireland

Our visit in Ireland was different than anything else we did on our trip because we spent it with family!

M’s grandpa is originally from Ireland {in case you couldn’t already tell from our very Irish surname!} and there’s still a group of the cousins that live near Galway, on the west coast of Ireland. It was great to spend a few days with them as our first stop in Europe.

We’d met some of the cousins two years ago because they came over to America for a vacation and specifically came to Utah to meet us, but there were others that we got to meet for the first time in Ireland.

These are the cousins {although I think they are technically third-cousins!} that are around the same ages.

And these are the relatives the next generation up.

Last but not least, these two are M’s grandpa’s brother and sister. M’s grandpa passed away almost 20 years ago, so it was fun for me to meet these two and hear their stories about their family.

We also spent time exploring Galway with the cousins. We walked along the promenade as well as through the streets downtown.

We also got to visit each family’s house. Anne is a landscaper and her backyard is gorgeous… and has several benches {yeah, one of those inside jokes - don't you wish you could have been there with us?!}…

And at Veronica’s house, M made a cute, new friend.

It was a lot of fun to see how green and fantastic Ireland is but it was also great to spend time with the relatives and get to know them better.

Oh. My. Goodness.

We did it. We survived our trip through Europe!

It was absolutely amazing {and I’ll be writing and posting photos very soon!} but right now I am just so excited to get to sleep in my own bed tonight!!

Always Playing Catch-Up

I don’t know how some people do it! You know, the ones with energetic kids, an important full-time job, and a stellar social life and yet they still always look put together and in their spare time make homemade crafts and volunteer at their local church activities… All I have that takes up my time is the job factor and yet sometimes feel like I can barely find any extra time or energy for anything else. In fact, I cheer like I won a gold medal if I do something like make it to the gym once that week.

So, of course, I feel like I never blog anymore! To those of you that like reading ramblings about my life {a.k.a. my mom}, I apologize for blog-slacking. And for those of you who find what I write quite droll and only check it out of obligation for our friendship {because you know I’ll annoyingly ask, “Didn’t you read about it on my blog?!”…} well, you’re welcome. I’m so behind on blogging that I guess we’ll have to actually talk like real, normal friends.

I’ve been working a fair bit of overtime to make sure all my work is caught up before we leave on our trip {which is in a week and two days… eeek!} I’m super excited but also a bit overwhelmed and nervous. We have the Ireland-Scotland-England portion of the trip pretty sussed out… but we still have a lot of planning left for the France-Switzerland-Italy half.

Besides working and trip-planning, life has also been a bit high-maintenance by demanding our time with few other events. Luckily, they were fabulously fun, so I’m only pretending to mind.

Two weeks ago, we got to spend the weekend with my cute family. I sure do like them… and when my dad takes us to play with guns {yes, I have the raddest dad in the world!} Ah, I miss the small-town life. It looks a little like this…

While there, I may or may not have also gotten my family addicted to Draw Something. For a few solid hours, M played on his phone while my mom, dad, little brother and sister squished on the couch with the 3 iPads in the house to draw pictures with each other. I love my nerdy family!

Another piece of exciting news is that M got another promotion! He was managing an office that the company considers a Level 1 {the levels are based on the size/amount of business done by the office} for only 5 months before his upper management specifically requested to have him apply for an manager position of a Level 2 office… and he got it!

I’m so proud of M. He is the kind of person any business would be glad to employ! He works so hard and is great with his customers. And in fact {okay, bragging time…} he totally revamped his last office and increased their profits dramatically in the short time he was there. I am so grateful he is such a great provider for us and is someone I can have so much respect for!

Speaking of M, his birthday was this week. It was his first day at the new office, but he was able to get away early, so we had more time to party. He was such a good sport to like the presents I got him. And I made the cheesecake we love!

Between awesome birthday parties, trips to see my family, and catching up on seemingly never-ending work has been awesome!

Once again, I apologize for being too busy to blog lately. But if it’s any consolation, I’ve neglected my Words with Friends and Draw Something games also. That’s pretty solid proof of my schedule issues, right?

But speaking of Drawsome and WWF, this graph was in a super legit work presentation discussing digital trends. And this slide of the presentation was the best part…

Happy Birthday M!

Happy birthday to the love of my life! 27 never looked so good!

We celebrated with burgers and cheesecake. Livin' the good life. I love this man!

Happy Easter {a.k.a. Chocolate Everywhere!}

I love love love holidays! So of course I was thrilled when I woke up to see that the Easter Bunny came!!

In our house, the Easter Bunny leaves a trail from bedroom doors to the baskets of goodies. It’s a tradition I grew up with this year and thought it was adorable that M surprised me with the same tradition for our Easter!

Of course, we got a ridiculous amount of delicious chocolate and an overload of sugar in each basket. We also got a couple new games {Scrabble Slam and Fruitominos} as well as a book to help us plan our trip to Europe!

For breakfast, I made pancakes that were supposed to look like bunnies but I think they ended up looking more like weird cats or something. Oops!

They still tasted awesome. Probably because of the chocolate chips.

This holiday was also really fun for me because it was the first since getting married that I actually got to cook our own holiday meal for M and I. It was the first time ever in my life that I cooked a whole ham.

So here was our feast: honey ham, rolls, au gratin potatoes, pineapple, my favorite ‘Nuts About Berries’ salad, and apple raspberry juice. Yum!

Safe And Sound

M made it back home safely on Sunday morning {even though he’s a punk and called to pretend there was a problem with the plane and said his flight was delayed for hours… but it was April Fools…} and I was SO glad to have him home!!

I knew I liked him a lot but I was surprised by how much I missed him! So it might seem like old news that he’s back since its been three days, but I still keep randomly thinking “Ah, I’m so glad M’s in Utah and that I get to see him after work tonight!”

You Are Beautiful. You Are Valuable. You Are Enough.

I’m having a sulky day. And I loved that a friend posted this on Facebook {I loved it so much that I’m reposting it here on my blog!} because something she says in here really hit home today.

Kate Conner blogged: 10 Things I Want to Tell Teenage Girls {and I say certainly not limited to teens!}

1. If you choose to wear shirts that show off your boobs, you will attract boys. To be more specific, you will attract the kind of boys that like to look down girls’ shirts. If that’s the kind of guy you want, great job – keep it up! But if you don’t want to date a guy who ogles at the breasts of other women, then maybe you should stop offering your own up for the ogling. All attention is NOT equal. You think you want attention, but you don’t. You want respect.

2. Don’t go to the tanning bed. You’ll thank me when you go to your high school reunion and you look like you’ve been airbrushed and then photoshopped compared to the tanning bed train wrecks formerly known as classmates – well, at least next to the ones that haven’t died from skin cancer.

3. When you talk about people “vaguely” on Facebook, we know exactly who you’re talking about. People are smarter than you think they are. Stop posting passive-aggressive statuses about the myriad of ways your friends disappoint you.

4. Newsflash: the number of times you say “I hate drama” is a pretty good indicator of how much you love drama. Non-dramatic people don’t feel the need to discuss all the drama they didn’t start and aren’t involved in.

5. “Follow your heart” is probably the worst advice ever. Your brain plays an important part in your life.

6. Never let a man make you feel weak or inferior because you are an emotional being. Emotion is good; it is nothing to be ashamed of. Emotion makes us better – so long as it remains in it’s proper place: subject to truth and reason.

7. Smoking is not cool. Nothing more to say about that.

8. Stop saying things like, “I don’t care what anyone thinks about me.” First of all, that’s not true. And second of all, if it is true, you need a perspective shift. Your reputation matters – greatly. You should care how your words and actions come across to other people.

9. Don’t play coy or stupid or helpless to get attention. Don’t pretend something is too heavy so that a boy will carry it for you. Don’t play dumb to stroke someone’s ego. Don’t bat your eyelashes in exchange for attention and expect to be taken seriously, ever. You can’t have it both ways. Either you show the world that you have a brain and passions and skills, or you don’t. There are no damsels in distress managing corporations, running countries, or managing households. The minute you start batting eyelashes, eyelashes is all you’ve got.

10. You are beautiful. You are enough. The world we live in is twisted and broken and for your entire life you will be subjected to all kinds of lies that tell you that you are not enough. You are not thin enough. You are not tan enough. You are not smooth, soft, shiny, firm, tight, fit, silky, blonde, hairless enough. Your teeth are not white enough. Your legs are not long enough. Your clothes are not stylish enough. You are not educated enough. You don’t have enough experience. You are not creative enough.

There is a beauty industry, a fashion industry, a television industry, (and most unfortunately) a pornography industry: and all of these have unique ways of communicating to bright young women: you are not beautiful, sexy, smart or valuable enough.

You must have the clarity and common sense to know that none of that is true. None of it.

You were created for a purpose, exactly so. You have innate value. You are loved more than you could ever comprehend; it is mind-boggling how much you are adored. There has never been, and there will never be another you. Therefore, you have unique thoughts to offer the world. They are only yours, and we all lose out if you are too fearful to share them.

You are beautiful. You are valuable. You are enough.