Surprise

“They’re so friendly. Don’t you think daisies are the friendliest flower?”

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Husbands {sigh}

Yesterday, T.J. and I ran into an old friend on campus, who was with a friend.  We had a funny moment that I thought I would share.

T.J.: So, what are you up to?

Friend: Just running some errands.

(T.J. thought she said, “Just running with Maren.”)

T.J. to her friend: Oh, I’m assuming you’re Maren.

Silence for a couple of seconds.  No one could understand what he was talking about.  I broke the silence because it was getting so awkward.

Katie: Well, that was weird.  We’ll see you around.

When we were walking away, I asked T.J. was the heck he was talking about.  He replied, “Well, she said she was running with Maren…”  Then it hit him.  “Ohhh, running some errands.”

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FHE: Week 2

You’d be proud of us.  Right after dinner we went to the living room and had another real FHE.

This week we sang “I am a Child of God.”  It turned into a singing competition, clearly.  T.J. sang (pretended to sing) bass.  I just sang really loud.  And at the end of the hymn, T.J. said, “Wow, I’m a really good singer.”

Then we opened up the newlywed FHE book again.  We found one called “Show, not Tell.”  That sounded intriguing.  It said the following:

When you let the love you have for your spouse wither and die, you are apostatizing from your marriage covenant.  You have as much responsibility to keep your love alive as you do to keep your testimony of the gospel alive.  How do you keep this love alive?  One way is to show it!  Create a list of the different ways you can show love to each other.  Discuss what you have written, then identify the top ten ways to show love. Now cut the list in half, and each of you take half.  Commit to use those five ways to show love during the coming week.

Here’s T.J.’s list, the ones that are circled are what we chose for him to focus on this week:

To clarify a few things, we didn’t circle the temple, praying, or studying the scriptures because those are obvious ones that we always work on.  And also, an inverted kiss is where you put in your lips like a person without teeth and kiss.  It’s very bizarre/awful/hilarious.

Anyway, it was actually a cute activity and was nice to talk about what we think we needed to work on.  And to finish, we studied our scriptures and went for a Snowie with spare change!

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Boogeymen

For some reason, I’m always scared someone is in my house or out to get me.  All the time.  And, it’s getting progressively worse.  Whenever I hear a noise in the house, I close my eyes and ask T.J. what it was.  It’s always just our neighbors, or the dishwasher, but for some reason, it won’t let up.

(Sidebar: I literally JUST heard screams outside! What the heck!?)

Anyway, I’m not sure when this started.  Years ago, though.  Sometimes when I was little and I was practicing the piano, I thought I saw ghosts out of the corner of my eye at the end of our hallway passing between the rooms. When I turned to look though, they weren’t there.  But, I still would freak myself out.

Also, I’m scared when I go out that creepy men will kidnap and R me. Whenever I see one in a parking lot, I pull out my keys so I’m ready to jab them if they try. I used to carry pepper spray on my key chain, but I lost it about a year ago.

I can’t watch ANY scary movies, I still picture the girl in the ring coming out of my TV and the little girl in The Sixth Sense under my bed.

Lastly, I always think T.J. is going to try to scare me.  I think he’s going to pop out at me, or sneak in when he comes home.  He never does, he never has, but still, my crazy mind tells me he will. (Probably because I had roommates AND a father who would do that to me!)

So because of this horror that I have created for myself, I make sure the doors are always locked at home, even when I’m inside.

But tonight, I came home and the back door was unlocked.  Bad news bears. And now that I’m thinking about it, what if a rapist is reading this right now and sees that my husband doesn’t lock the doors?  Well, let me tell you that it was just this once!!! And be warned it will never happen again, because I gave T.J. a nice little talk about how we ALWAYS lock the doors in our house, and as soon as we aren’t in debt, we will have a security system.

Well, to end the story, I made T.J. go around the different rooms to search for boogeymen and/or intruders.

P.S. Looking up the spelling of boogeymen on google didn’t help the situation.  Lots of terrible pictures came up.
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Similes, Smiles, and Harry Potter

So, T.J. and I haven’t been the greatest at doing a “scheduled Family Home Evening” each week. Since we pray and read the scriptures together, and hang out together everyday, all day, we kind of forget that we should do it. Well, one of my goals for the week was to have FHE.

Monday came along, but we kind of brushed it off until T.J.’s brother Dustin and his wife Lindsay stopped by. We all decided to do FHE together using an activity in our “FHE for Newlyweds” book. Here’s how the rest of the night went.

  • Arguing whether or not we should sing, I said we should because our Stake President told us to always sing a hymn before FHE.
  • Opening Song: I’m trying to be like Jesus to the tune of Harry Potter Theme
  • Opening Prayer (we actually didn’t have to do “not it” or “nose goes”, we are mature and righteous)
  • Randomly opening the book to find an activity
  • Activity: “Similes and Smiles”
    • The point of the activity is to compare your spouse to each of the things listed.  Some of the items were shoes, cars, places, celebrities, and animals.
  • Cars Simile
    • Katie: T.J. you are like a lamborghini.  You’re reallllly cool, slick, and stylish!
    • T.J.: You are like a beetle bug.
    • Katie: Really? Cause I hate that car more than anything…
  • Shoes Simile
    • K: You are like a pair of oxfords because they are my favorite and what I really want right now.
    • T: You are like oxfords too!
    • K: Did you just say that because I said that?
    • T: Well, I couldn’t think of any other shoe.
  • Animal
    • I compared him to a panther and T.J. compared me to a mini giraffe. Not much dialogue to this one.
  • Celebrity

Dustin and Lindsay didn’t participate too much, they mostly just laughed.  Although Lindsay compared Dustin to a moose, but I’m pretty sure that’s just because her favorite animal is a moose.

The point of the story here is that, although we need to be doing FHE, I’m not really sure if this one needed to be had.  But I must say, it was memorable, if nothing else.

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Flash Back

So, I finally wrote in my journal yesterday with all the deets of our engagement story.  I know it’s late.  But better late than never right?

Since I didn’t have this blog when we were engaged, I thought I’d share the story with you.

Background: We had talked about marriage, but hadn’t set any dates or planned anything. We also didn’t want that long of an engagement, and T.J. said he didn’t have money for a ring, so I figured he wouldn’t propose for a month or so.  But back in December, we had looked at rings and I just was so eager to get engaged and start the planning! Oh and one last thing, since we had talked about marriage, I wanted to the proposal to be a complete surprise.  I’m not a fan of the cheese.  I just wanted it to be all of a sudden and out of the blue.

It was Friday January 8th, T.J. took me to Red Robin for dinner.  While we were waiting to be seated, we walked through mall (I bought an amazing down coat–another awesome thing from the night) and when we were in Gap, I saw T.J.’s feet dancing in the dressing room and heard him snapping and singing. I asked him,

“T, are you dancing?”

“Uh… yeah… I just had a good day at work.”  (Really he was excited for the rest of the evening.)

Strange, but that’s why I love him.

I was pretty tired after dinner so we just went home for a while and watched The Office. All night he talked about how he wanted to go to Chili’s to get our favorite lava cake dessert.  I was kind of confused why we would go to another restaurant that night, especially after eating a lot of dinner, but he was so persistent.  He just said he was craving it and so I went along.

When we got to Chili’s, we ordered and he left to go the restroom (he actually went and arranged with the waiter what he wanted to happen).  When our cake came out, there was a note addressed to me.  I looked around thinking someone “sent me a note” like a mormon version of “sending over a drink” or something flirtatious like that.  Then I looked at T.J. and asked,

“Wait, is this from you.”

He nodded.  I opened it up and thought he was just being cute like normal.  Sometimes he writes me notes and poems, so I didn’t think anything was up.

There was a poem inside (his Grandpa used it to propose as well), but I couldn’t finish reading because I noticed T.J. reaching in his coat pocket.

“T.J. what are you doing?  WHAT are you doing?!?”

He didn’t say anything back, he just nervously smiled, eyes wide, eyebrows raised.

Kneeling down on one knee, he asked if I would marry him… Or something like that, we don’t really remember the wording.  And I don’t remember if I said yes right away, I just met him on the ground, kissed and hugged him.

We were so excited/anxious/nervous to eat our cake.  I couldn’t get the fork to my mouth without making a mess.

Anyway, it was great.  I was completely surprised and loved how it was out of the blue and random.   Oh and he arranged with his coworker, Abby, so she could take pictures of the whole thing.  I didn’t even realize she was there until after he proposed!

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T is the new Billy

This is Jana and Billy.

They are T.J.’s and my idols.  We don’t actually know them, but we think they are the cutest and trendiest couple ever.

When we were engaged, we compared everything we did to them.  We even tried to reserve the art gallery they had their reception at, but unfortunately it closed down.  I wanted her dress, her shoes, her hair.  T.J. wanted his suit, his shoes, his sockless feet.  I know it is tacky to copy others, but if you’re gonna copy someone, it might as well be them.

We didn’t actually end up copying anything that they did, but we still say things like, “Oh that is so Jana.” We probably sound like stalkers, but I promise it’s nothing too weird, we just adore their style.

Anyway, when I met T.J. at his office today, he walked out with his pants rolled up. Seeing that it hadn’t flooded today, I had to ask him why the heck he did that.

“I’m Billy!”

Oh my gosh, T.J. is so precious. He was so excited to show me his fashion statement.  Now, I do not want to say anything negative about my husband. But I will just say, I may or may not have begged him to roll them back down before we went outside.

That is all.

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2 Months

I’ve been married for 2 months, today.

Half of me feels like it has been 2 weeks. Half of me feels like it has been 2 years.

What I’ve learned:

Communication is key.

A husband can’t read their wife’s mind. A wife can’t read their husband’s mind.

Saving money is essential, yet nearly implausible.

Without the gospel, marriage would be impossible.  With it, marriage is bliss.

Oh, and I definitely have the most

amazing, precious, handsome and thoughtful husband

who is perfect for me.

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1 month down, Infinity to go

Well, today we have been married for one month.  That obviously makes me an expert on marriage.  So here are some things I have learned:

  1. I will not allow my children to play video games with guns.  Explanation: T.J.’s cousin has her PS2 and games at our house still and so T.J. is currently trying to beat one of the games.  He enjoys it, so I don’t mind having him play, plus we made a deal that if he plays those games he can’t complain or make fun of me reading Twilight.  But I have realized from this experience I do not want my children playing video games all day long, especially any games with guns because I hate the sound and there are so many other productive activities.
  2. I really enjoy cooking.  I took a class back in high school that taught me the basics, but I haven’t really used those skills until now.  It may seem weird, but I just feel accomplished when I make a good and well-balanced meal for T.J. and I.  Plus it’s fun to try new recipes and eat new foods.
  3. Life goes fast and will always be busy.  We have been married for a month, but it feels just like a few days.  We have done a lot this past month–traveled, moved, cleaned, worked–but it has been in this time that I have realized it will always be hectic, unexpected events will always come up.  So it’s important to make priorities and stick to your plans, especially the priority of courting and visiting the temple.
  4. Patience is a virtue, one that I need to work on.
  5. Living with a husband is a lot different than living with roommates.  It’s 100 times better, but sometimes is twice as hard (does that even make sense?).  Let me try to explain.  It’s the best time I have ever had, but I think my emotions sometimes make T.J. wonder if I’m clinically insane.  On the other hand, a roommate would just know in a week, I’ll be back to normal.  But he’ll get there 😉
  6. I don’t actually know too much about marriage.
  7. I also have no idea how people get married and don’t include prayer or scripture study into their lives.  It is my lifeline.

So there it is.  Oh and I’m just kidding about the blog post title.  I am extremely grateful to be married to T.J.  It has been a great month and I am very excited for the the many months to come.

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From Roommate to Housewife

Before I was married, I rarely cooked.  It wasn’t that I don’t know how, it was just because I didn’t have time and my apartment’s kitchen was too small for six girls.  But now that I have the space and a little more time, plus we need to save money, I’ve started making three new recipes for dinner each week!

My sister gave me these Everyday Food magazines (by Martha Stewart :)) and so I rip out three recipes at the beginning of each week, put them on our fridge and get all the ingredients on Monday.  I’ve never shopped for my meals before, usually I just shop for food and make meals from what I have, and that would consist of pop tarts, goldfish, and diet coke.

Anyway, here are some of the recipes we’ve tried!  You should try them out because they’re way easy, delicious, and always make enough for leftovers.

1. Whole-wheat spaghetti with vegetables and peanut sauce

T.J. had never had peanut sauce before, but I swear I’ve never seen anyone consume so many noodles in such a short amount of time like he did.

2. Chicken with coconut sauce: I couldn’t find the recipe for this one online, but all you do is grill 4 boneless chicken breasts on your George Foreman grill.  At the same time, simmer a can of coconut milk for 20 minutes.  When finished, add 1 tbs of fresh lime juice and 2 jalepeno chilis.  Finish by putting the chicken and sauce over a plate of rice with a lime garnish.

3. Grilled Pork Chops with mini cornbread puddings

This cornbread pudding recipe is a lot different that a cornbread muffin recipe, but they’re delicious and the leftovers have made a great breakfast snack.

4. Buttermilk baked chicken with spinach salad

I loved this recipe, especially because the chicken had a great marinade and the spinach salad’s dressing was homemade.

5. Pork quesadillas

This, by far, has been my favorite dinner so far.  The recipe includes a lot of random ingredients, like pickles (which I don’t even like usually), ham, grilled pork, and spicy mustard.  But the combination was delicious.  (Btw, the picture on the link is not right, they look just like a normal quesadilla.)

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