2008 Recap

Sam and I haven't been up to a whole lot this past year. Dec 2007 we moved in w/his sister to help her as she went through a divorce. He was finally hired at the Utah State Prison and started March 31, we were so excited that he finally achieved the first part of his dream of becoming an investigator. I worked for Discover Financial Services from the end of January to the end of April, when I was hired as a nanny for a family in Kaysville. We had some problems with our ex-brother-in-law during the summer, but we were able to resolve those issues so no harm would come to anyone in the house. September brought us around to so unexpected events. Firstly we went looking at puppies, just to look, and ended up buying 2 parakeets, Molly and Petey, (we couldn't have dogs). Secondly an increase in rent came around, so we decided it was in our best interests to move into separate places. Sam's sister and her kids found a nice little 3 bedroom apartment and we began the process of house hunting. We expected to be into a place within a month, so it came as a surprise when we ended up at Dolly's for 2 months. Even though we got discouraged and had a number of contracts fall through it was all worth it to find our nice little condo in South Salt Lake. We moved in in Dec 2008 and finally are almost settled. We just need to figure out how to get rid of some excess stuff so we can free up our spare room. :) We've made it nice a cozy. It's not perfectly organized and will never be in Better Homes and Gardens, but it's functional for us and it's a nice change.

In December I made a turkey for the first time. It was the best turkey I've ever had, I may be biased, though. It had great flavors and was moist. In November I made rolls for the first time, and though they were really huge, they were good. Basically, since I haven't been swamped with school work, I've been able to challenge my culinary skills and I'm finding I am a really awesome cook. Amanda and Mike come over all the time and we love cooking for them. We had some of their friends over when we received the best compliment ever, "You're really good cooks. You should open a restaurant." Very flattering, but our skills need to be honed a bit, especially mine.

Now we're back in Salt Lake and we have 2 running cars we're seeing more of our friends and getting more done. We're hanging out and no longer feel like the Logan Lepers. We try and have a date alone once a week and have M&M over at least twice a month - usually it's more. With Sam's new schedule, 12 hour with rotating shift every week, it's gotten harder for us to see each other, and to spend time with family, but we're only in our second week of this new schedule, and it will get better. Once we've got it down I'm sure this blog will become unimportant, as we may have time to get on the phone and chat with everyone!

The only other thing that's new in our lives is that I am now the Treasurer for our HOA committee. Right now we need reform and with new blood I'm sure we'll change things for the better. Get a better sense of community, help everyone to be more courteous and neighborly. We're hoping to stretch our budget to accommodate any problems, make improvements and add in monthly get togethers.

The only thing we're hearing about another deployment is for 2 detachments from Sam's unit in 2010. For those who want to know, if his detachment isn't called up, but they do ask for volunteers, he will be going again. No doubt about it. It's his job, even if he is only a Reservist, and we know that it means serving even if you don't have to, especially when you do want to, so you can improve life for others.

On baby-watch news: we still are waiting, no matter how many rumors are going around (most are started by us lol). However, Mary is due at the end of April, Sarah is due at the end of March, Sam's brother and his wife are due in August, I think. As for Dolly, she lost Lazero at 24 weeks. Her water broke at 20 weeks, and was hospitalized in the beginning of January. We don't know the cause of death, but we know why he died. If he hadn't gone when he had, and if Dolly hadn't had a C-section she either would have died or would have been in the ICU without knowing why. It turns out that, even though she was on mega antibiotics, she got an infection. No one knew it was there, there were no signs until she went into labor. Everyone was sad, but we all thought we weren't as sad as we should be, because Lazero became our hero and we will always be grateful for his sacrifice because it means our sister/mom/wife/daughter/cousin/aunt is still with us to lead and guide us.

Overall, life is treating us well. We're learning so much and having a blast with all our new opportunities. I'm trying to get better with this whole blogging thing, but as I can't even write for myself regularly, it's an up hill battle that I'm happy to face head on.