Isabelle Rose

It's been two months and one day since I lost our baby,

I think about her literally every day.
Every. Day.

Remember how I was sure the baby was a girl?

And we were going to name her Isabelle Rose?

Well, I work with some really cool women.

And they gave me a rose bush to plant on the due date of Isabelle Rose. 

It was to grow as she would have grown. 

It was very sweet and thought.

I loved it.

I still love it. 

In fact I think I love it even more these days.

You see, when we got the bush, it was empty.

I couple of dead looking brown sticks with thorns.

Well, now it looks like this:

It's growing like crazy!

It has rose buds about to blossom.

Lots of green tall stems and leaves.

It's already beautiful.

But the crazy thing is: We've never once watered it.

Not a drop.

All of a sudden, with nothing from us, it was growing.

Now, I don't know a thing about gardening or planting or rose bushes.

Maybe roses don't need water to grow.

I don't know.

But I'm telling myself they do need water. 

And that it somehow grew without water or any care.

And that makes this rose bush symbolizing my Isabelle Rose so beautiful.

The Wrong Generation

Well, the new year has begun, and I must say!!...

...it feels pretty normal.

Our New Year's was pretty low-key.

We had a game night just the two of us in our apartment, then watched some movies, and of course, the countdown to midnight.

We toasted our sparkling grape juice in our wine glasses, took a sip, and kissed to the beginning of a new year...

...and the beginning of new beginnings!

This year, I am guessing, will be a year of newness.

New apartment.

New sealed marriage.

New baby...hopefully at some point...growing in my tummy this year. 

New experiences.

New memories.

Just newness.

I'm usually not big on New Year's resolutions. 

I think they're kind of dumb.

In my opinion, you should be striving to be your best self all year, not just starting over on New Years.

But, I kinda caved this year.

And made a resolution.

Well, I just made this resolution today.

While on pinterest.

Can you figure it out??

Sewing.

I want to learn how to sew.

For myself...and our future kiddies.

I want to be able to sew blankets and quilts.

And all sorts of cute goodies!

Another thing I've started this year?

Couponing.

That's right.

The once cashier, hater of all couponers, is now a couponer herself.

It's actually kinda fun to do!

I made my coupon binder last week, it's already full of goodies, and I can't wait to use them!

Now that Thomas and I are finally living on own, couponing is basically a necessity. 

We'll see how it pans out.

The biggest lesson I've learned just from researching how to coupon??

Plan you meals around your groceries, not your groceries around your meals.

A {perfectly} cooked honey glazed ham. I just about peed
my pants with excitement when I took my first bite!
Seriously.

And might I just say, my meal making is outstanding these days!

I love having my own kitchen!!

I love cooking and baking and eating! 

:) 

In fact, there are two loaves of some yummy bread baking in the oven as we speak.

Or...ya know...I type...

It sure smells divine here!

And I am getting more and more confident in my cooking abilities every day!

I love being a wife.

Sometimes, I think I was born in the wrong generation.

Maybe I was meant to be in my grandmother's generation.

Because I want nothing more than to spend my days in the kitchen.

I love to cook.

I love to keep my home clean and tidy.

I love to pamper my husband.

And my dream job is a stay-at-home mom.

Some women these days would call me crazy.

I think they're the crazy ones. 

I apologize.
I feel like this post has gone off on several different tangents.

Well, now you have an idea of how my brain works!

For Time & All Eternity

Well it's been a few weeks.

Oofda!

Crazy busy times + no internet = no blogging.

But now I'm sitting in our living room, cuddled up to my hubby, watching Forrest Gump while we paint some artwork for our new place.

I gave up on my painting.

For now anyway...

And decided I wanted to blog instead.

Writing comes far more naturally to me than painting. 

So! Busy busy awesome times!

We moved into our apartment one week ago.

I am loving it!
It's wonderful to finally have our own place!
We still have just a few more stuff to unpack, but we're almost complete!

Don't worry, I'll get pics up eventually...

But more important than our moving in, Thomas and I were finally sealed today!

{There's some "sneak peak" pictures below, curtosy of Kristin Jones - - Check her out!! --> http://www.anyanglephotography.com/}

It was a perfectly wonderful ceremony,

If you're unfamiliar with what I'm talking about, allow me to explain...

In Mormonism, we have different ordinances that we participate in throughout our lives. These include baptism, confirmation, and sealing.

To be sealed to your spouse is to be bound as husband and wife for eternity.

In a typical civil marriage, a couple is married unto "death parts us."

But in an LDS temple marriage, a husband and wife are married "for time and all eternity."

Typically, when two Mormon members want to marry, they get married in the temple. However, because I was a convert, and my entire family was Catholic and therefore unable to enter the temple for the ceremony, Thomas and I chose to get married in a chapel instead of a temple, which meant it was to be a civil ceremony. 

We then had to wait a year before we could receive our sealing and be bound together for eternity in the St. Paul Temple.

If it's confusing, check out my post: What's the Difference?

I explain it all in there. 

So today was the day.

And it was perfect.

I was kneeling at the alter, holding my wonderful husband's hands, listening to the words in this blessing, and this overwhelming feeling of gratitude and thankfulness flooded me. 

Here I was, with this amazing man before me, and he had chosen me to spend the rest of forever with.

Do you understand how long forever is? 

It's a long time.

I started crying as I thought of everything we've been through to get to where we finally are.

Almost seven years of ups, downs, mountains to climb, easy times to soar through. 

Almost seven years of laughter, tears, joy, and pain.

Here was someone before me who had stood by side through so much in life. 

I knelt there thinking I am such a lucky woman.

Because I know, for a surety, that this man is someone who will never forsake me.

He'll take care of me when I'm sick.

He'll make me happy when I'm sad.

He'll be strong when I'm weak.

He'll be my shoulder when I need to cry.

He'll be my better half...forever.

Sometimes, especially lately, I get frustrated when I think of our relationship. I throw myself pity parties, and sit thinking about how Thomas and I have had to do "everything" the hard way: the mission, my conversion, almost seven years of mountains to climb. our wedding, and our miscarriage.

But today, kneeling at that alter, thinking about everything Thomas & I have had to work through to get to that alter today, instead of feeling frustrated, I felt overjoyed. I felt grateful. Those trials have made Thomas and I so strong. 

Our relationship is deep and true and full.

And through every battle we've had to fight, Thomas has stood by my side.

Thomas has been my better half.

And he's now my better half for eternity. 

I know I gush about him a lot.

I know I get mushy gushy and make you want to gag.

But today was the most meaningful, important day of my life. 

I am so thankful that Heavenly Father brought Thomas and i together. 

I don't believe it's coincidence that Thomas' family moved here from England for his dad's work. 

It was purposeful.

It was one of the first step's in God's plan.

I am so eager for our future together.

I am so eager to see what else Heavenly Father has in store for us. 

I love this life.

I love my husband.

Kids vs Grownups

It's kind of amazing how your attitude about winter changes as you grow.

When you're little, you love it.

The snow is magical.

It's fun.

It means Santa and no school and snow forts.

You love it.

When you're a grownup, you hate it.

You dread winter approaching.

The snow is evil.

It means brushing and scraping your car.

It means icy roads and terrible driving.

You hate it.

Generally, I act like a normal adult come winter time.

I dread it.

However, I was ecstatic when the snow began to fall two days ago...

Remember our wedding last year?
How there wasn't a flake of snow on the ground?
I was SO excited to have a gorgeous winter wedding.

Beautiful pictures out in the snowy, gorgeous winter wonderland.

Well, had to scratch that.

Instead, we got pictures with barren trees and yellow grass.

They were great, don't get me wrong.

But what a boring backdrop..

Well! The time has come!

In 11 days Thomas and I will have our temple sealing!
And more pictures!!

We wear our wedding outfits.

So I'll be in my wedding dress, Thomas in a nice suit.

And we're going to get pictures of the big occasion outside the temple, surrounded in a gorgeous winter wonderland!

We have a second chance of pictures with snow!

I am super excited!

December is a Good Month

I've been having lots of fun baking recently!

Baking.

Not cooking.
I always thought I like cooking more...turns out, I just might like baking!

And might I add, not only have I been baking more, but I've been baking goooooood stuff.

Like, actually successful good.

Finger-lickin' good.

Yummy in your tummy good.

Ya know what I mean??

Maybe this is it.

Ya know how I'm a disastrous cook?

MAJOR disaster?

Perhaps it's because I'm meant to bake!

So! What am I making these days??

First, it was the peach cobbler.

From scratch, might I add.

Paula Dean's Peach Cobbler.

And it was MIGHTY tasty.

It looked just like this:

Literally.

Perfectly golden brown.

Sprinkled with just enough cinnamon.

Oooh my goodness, I almost cried tears of joy when I pulled it out of the oven. I had never in my life cooked something even close to as perfect as that.

And it was a SUPER easy recipe too!
(Obviously, if I could make it!)

My next baking tackle?

The Pineapple Angel Food Cake I found on Pinterest.

Ahh Pinterest.

You are so amazing...

Anywho, it was this:

That's literally all you need.

Two ingredients.

Mix it up.

Put it in the oven.

Voila!

Okay, this one wasn't so much of a baking experience.

But it was delish!

Served it with whipped cream.

If I were to make it again, I'd make a cool whip frosting.

And the latest baking blue ribbon:

Gingerbread Cheesecake Bites.

My new favorite Christmas cookie.

Now, mine looked NOTHING like what you see here.

They were quite ugly.

I had a rather incredibly difficult time managing the cheesecake filling and getting it to fill the cookies all nice and pretty like you see here...

but the important thing is: Even though they looked ugly, they tasted so pretty in my mouth! I have eaten far too many.

That's the other wonderful "problem" with these: They're bite size. So you constantly think, "Oh just one more..."

Which, as we all know, really means six more...

Oh well.

Totally worth it.

As a completely different side note: I'm supposed to be 13 weeks now, into my second trimester. I had a really hard time with it on Sunday, I was crying in church. When I told Thomas why I was so upset, he held me and said, "You're not supposed to be in your second trimester. If you were meant to be, you would be. It wasn't meant to be yet."

I know he was trying to comfort me and be sweet, but man, that was a tough pill to swallow.

I keep getting weekly emails from "thebump.com" telling me how my baby is growing week-by-week...I really gotta delete my account or something...

We move into our apartment in ten days.

TEN DAYS.

I know. I'm freaking out too.

We have I think six boxes packed..,

Um, yeah...work to do...

And then we celebrate our One Year Anniversary in 12 days! 

And then we finally get Sealed in 17 days!

And then Christmas celebrations begin in 19 days!

Man.

December is a good month.