The month of July so far....

I know I am behind again but here we go...

This fourth of July I wanted to be more relaxed than it has been the last couple of years. No big multiple family get togethers-just my small family. ***Note***Don't get me wrong, I love big family get togethers but on a holiday like this where a significant meaning is attached, I just wanted quiet and time to reflect on our freedoms...after all, this is WHY we have Independance Day. We went to my brother's house where we grilled shis-kabobs. Afterwards, we went down to the City of Mesa fourth of july celebration to watch fireworks and view a small presentation about our nation's freedom that included a photo of my father-in-law. He went down to California several months ago to take pictures for a photographer who was trying to capture photos of the founding fathers...signing the declaration of independance. Here is the picture my father in law was in (he is the second one from the right), and following are pictures from our fourth of july celebration:

We even got mom and dad Bunzell (David's parents) to come see fireworks with us too! (And they also came to see the presentation that David's dad was in) So happy they came!

I am so grateful to live in this free land! On to the next news, my husband and his sister have been trying to get in shape so that they can hike Havasupai Falls in the Grand Canyon next month with my brother and sister-in-law. As part of their "training" this week, they decided to do a small hike up to the WindCaves. I didn't go because 1. I am not fond of hiking 2. It's summer and rattlesnakes are out-no thank you :) 3. A 4:30a.m. hike to beat the 115 degree July weather is not my idea of fun. Here is a picture from their outing.

And lastly...this past week we have had so much fun enjoying the lightening storms and monsoon season. I got to play ultimate frisbee with my husband and his family (although i'm not much good at all, it was good exercise). Later in the week, my husband's uncle's field (where we play frisbee) flooded with irrigation so some single's ward friends and family members played ultimate frisbee in the irrigation. I was the photographer :) Here are some action shots-sorry for the poor quality, camera isn't that great.

Oh What do you Do in the Summertime....

Homework, Homework, did I say homework? I decided I was tired of looking at my grandma's funeral pictures when I opened up my blog. Needed more cheery photos.

This summer has been extremely busy, full of excitement, and full of fear as well as sleepless nights/sick stomachs. This whole month of June is supposed to be my last month of summer school courses and Adult therapy clinic at ASU----before I was supposed to graduate FOR GOOD the first week of July. After two weeks (and only being in the clinic for two days), my supervisors did a midterm assessment and basically failed me in every area. I ended up having to write up a contract showing how I would improve myself in all of these areas within the following two weeks. I was so sick, didn't want to eat. I had two full years of excellent grades/reviews in the schools, and I couldn't believe that two weeks before I was to graduate, my professors were threatening to not let me graduate. Mind you I already have a job lined up to be a Speech Language Pathologist. The only other second year in clinic also got the same failing midterm. After much talking with fellow students and my sweet husband, I decided I was going to push forward , 300miles per hour and really prove to these supervisors that I am competent and ready to graduate-my last two weeks of therapy have been wonderful. Next week is judgement day as it's our last week of clinic----PLEASE keep me in your prayers!

On a more positive note, last week we got to see our adorable 3-year old niece perform in her first dance recital. She did so well! I haven't been to a dance recital for a long long time so it was really fun to see all the dancers come out and perform. I realized that if I were ever going to put my daughters in dance, that I would definitely put them in ballet. They were the most organized groups and I loved the music! They took songs like "we will rock you" and turned them classical with electric violins playing the songs. Loved it! Here are some pictures from the evening....

The Star of the Show with her trophy

Funerals and Family

This past week has definitely been a whirlwind and I feel as though I can't keep my feet on the ground! To start, two Saturdays ago, my grandma Johnson passed away. She had been in pain for the last several months due to a fall she had back in December. She just couldn't get better. It's been really hard to grasp the concept of her being gone when the last time I had seen her back in December.....she was perfect spry, walking, healthy and had normal cognition. But she is in a better place and after 25 years of being alone, she can finally be united with her sweetheart. We will miss you grandma! How grateful we are that families can be together forever!

On the same day, three of my aunts from Washington, Oregon, and Montana and an uncle from Utah came down to celebrate my Grandma Munro's (mom's mom) 80th birthday. The three days they were here were filled with uncontrollable laughter and late nights. We as a family went to Rockin' R Ranch Saturday night. The atmosphere and gold panning were so fun (David found the jackpot gold rock!), but the dinner and entertainment were very weak and disappointing. My husband said that things were SO much better years ago there. Here are some fun pictures we took though.

My mom with her sisters, brother, and Aunt

He proposed!!!! At a little church even!

Could be niece be any cuter!?!

And this week of course, schools are getting our for the summer and next week I begin summer school again! But these are the last two classes I will ever take and boy does it feel good! (Doing the happy Dance!)

We have finally moved into our house and are experiencing the joys and sorrow of being homeowners, especially for the first time :) The day after we moved in, my husband went to turn the water valve off so that we could fix the kitchen sink (we were told we shouldn't use it until we got it fixed), and the valve broke off. 24 hours later with no running water and 6 trips to Lowe's for wrong parts, we had a new kitchen faucet and running water. David sprayed our weed infested yard twice with bug spray and now almost two weeks later, the weeds are shriveling up. David spent the last few days painting our computer room, and after he finished, he told me to do the baseboards. I was home alone and went in the room to search for tape when all of a sudden a scorpion (mind you i've NEVER lived in a place with scorpions before and have aweful nightmares when i see bugs of any kind), started crawling across the bedroom floor. I freaked out, found the nearest smashing tool (in this case it was a hammer) bent down over the thing and whacked it. The body disappeared for a while and it was only with a blacklight later that I found the dead body under a ball of tape in the room. Don't know where the thing came from and I am praying we don't see anymore for a long long time.

I am wrapping up my second to last semester and am walking for graduation next Friday! I will finish my masters degree in speech therapy at the end of June.

Change is in the Air

and most of the changes scare me! :) I've been neglecting my blog for the last few weeks but all for good reason. After much persistence on the part of our loan officer and realtor, we finally signed the papers to our house last Friday and are hoping to get the keys tomorrow (hopefully...because i'm starting to bring my breakable things over tomorrow, so i better have keys!). We are so excited to have space and a less cluttered looking house. I am nervous that we might have scorpions which i have never had before. Luckily my sweet husband went out and bought some heavy duty bug spray-gallon size, and a black light. I told him he has to be the one to look and kill them at night, otherwise I will have nightmares..much like the one I had Monday after going scorpion hunting for the first time with my father-in-law at his house Sunday night. I couldn't sleep all night and dreamt that there were scorpions on or near me-ah!

I also interviewed and got hired by the Gilbert School District to be an SLP next year but had an interview with the only open school in the district for the position yesterday and I really felt intimidated and as though I wasn't smart enough to do the job. I just got an email from the Mesa District saying they are hiring SLP's, but I already told gilbert I would work for them (no contract yet though)...so what do I do? I am tossing and turning over where I should be next year and where I would have the most support until I feel like I have a better sense of the routine and what I am doing.

With moving, comes a new ward. We have absolutely loved the ward we were in, but we had a large variety of people from different aspects of life-most were older and had several kids or lived in 500,000+ dollar homes. I especially am nervous about moving to a new area where I know no-one but I am praying that we will establish close friendships in the new ward. I haven't mentioned yet, I hate changes.

Hopefully the next post will include us with our house!

Today, I am grateful

For many reasons.....
1. This morning as I was driving to work I stopped at an intersection a mile from my home. I saw a car flipped on its side and another car behind it the was right side up but severely crunched. As I fully came to a stop, I saw the right side up car's driver run out of his vehicle to see if the overturned car's passengers were fine. I also saw a bystander sprint to see if he could help while his wife called 911. It was then that I realized I literally missed this accident, and potentially being in it, by seconds. I was going to leave for work earlier to make up some time but thank my guardian angels for causing things to delay me leaving.

2. I had an interview with the Gilbert School District and they are really excited to have me work as a Speech Language Pathologist with them next year!

3. I realized on Sunday that my graduate plan of study had been sent back to me for revision and if i did not amend it and get a bunch of signatures by tomorrow evening, I would have to pay an extra 35$ on top of the regular 50$ to graduate. I was to the point where with all the work I would have to do, that I didn't care to walk at ASU's masters graduation ceremony. I figured the only people that came to my bachelors graduation was my immediate family and they could see me in my gown and robes any ol' day :). The one reason I want to walk is because all of my friends in my program are.....not to mention I have worked my butt off to get this degree, its hasn't been easy, and have received so much grief from professors (thats another story). Anyways, I realize it was my fault and should have checked to see if it was approved months ago. I am thankful for angels getting these papers signed and approved as of noon today, and for people who are willing to help me in a crunch.

4. I am grateful that we got an extension approved on our house so that we could close at a later date when our loan goes through (and hopefully before we have to be out of our apartment).

5. A small bit of thankfulness (if i can say so)...LOST is on tonight, and it is my obsession

My list could go on. I have been so downtrodden with how much "work" I have to do and it never decreases. I am so grateful for the days that the Lord helps me realize that with all the trials going on, there are rays of sunshine that poke through and that I am really blessed all the time.

After months of searching, David and I are pleased to announce that we finally found a beautiful home that is close to our families!! Our inspection went well and we are waiting for our loan to go through...hopefully closing in the middle of April. It's so strange how things work out. I was ready to throw in the towel after putting so many offers out, having to back out of a house, and running out of time. I feel like we look in areas that were not ideally where we'd like to be, just so we could make this tax credit deadline. I know the Lord truly was just waiting for the right house to open up and in a location that would be close to our families. Its a 4bed/1.75 bath in East Mesa. I must admit I am highly nervous about having to pay the extra bills while not knowing what my job situation will be like next year, but again I know that as we are doing everything we can and paying our tithing...things will work out. Here is a picture of future home:

I did end up taking my huge Praxis exam two weeks ago and am now anxiously awaiting my test results. I feel like I did ok, and I studied for several months...so hopefully my good guessing and gut feelings were enough to get me the score i needed to pass. I believe in miracles :) David is in the process of filling out his CASPA application to try to apply to PA school. I am so proud of him and all of his hard work. He will hopefully graduate in December with his Bachelors.

This past week was spring break and I had such a great time. I have never had a full week of (and several days with David off too) to just go play, usually spring break with the public schools and ASU are on seperate weeks. We got to go to the Zoo with family as well as hiking, potlucks, and games. It made me realize just how much I miss out of living life because I work so many hours and when i'm not working i'm in school or doing homework...its rare that I get a break for more than a few hours everyweek. Only a few more weeks til this semester is through...like the little engine that could "I think I can, I think I can, I think I can!!!"

These last few weeks, and this one especially have been filled with sleepless worrisome nights. This week alone I have had 3 midterm exams from yesterday until tomorrow (saturday through monday). The first exam took me roughly 9 hours to complete, the second about an hour and a half and who knows what tomorrow holds. I knew getting into this semester would be by far my most difficult one as I'm taking three graduate courses, working 3 jobs totalling 42ish hours a week and trying to buy a home. Little I know just how hard it would be. My grades have not been the best and I feel like this is because there is SO much going on that I can't be the best at any one thing.

Last week we got the inspection completed on a home that we had looked at (offer was accepted) and the inspection came out really really good. We would be getting a killer of a deal on the house but the stresses come with me not having a job over the summer (as I work for the schools) and thus no income, draining most of our savings to pay for the costs of buying a home, and not knowing what the next school year will hold financially. This house is in a great location close to both of our families its just that the bills will be rising..stress, stress, stress :) I think that has become my most used word!

I have my HUGE exam called the PRAXIS that I am taking this upcoming Saturday and this is the mega test that determines (along with me passing my last few classes) whether or not I will get my masters degree. So for any and all out there, i could use several prayers on my behalf and lots of miracles. This week I also have an interview with the lead speech pathologist in my gilbert school district to try to apply for a job as a speech therapist in the district...right now i am only an assistant. Now normally most districts would have tons of job openings but in light of all the budget cuts, we have only a few positions open and again i need prayers that I will get one of these positions.

The one big relief is that Spring Break is next week and I will have a full week off of work and school. We're trying to hold onto our hats as the wind is blowing at full force these days!

And the search goes on.....

and on and on.....Exhibit#3:

So to update on our house search....we put an offer on another house 2 weeks ago, got accepted went through the inspection and the house had termites, roof needed replacing, ac unit wouldn't start up etc etc. And we had thought that after all the houses we looked at that this one was pretty amazing. New paint, clean, nothing visibly broken. Well the inspector proved that wrong and i'm so grateful we had him. And so, this morning we put another offer in for the house pictured above. It is way out on Crismon/University and quite the distance from where any of our families live. But I have learned that if you put in an offer around the parts of town we want to be in for the price we can afford, you end up with older houses that need some fixin. This house above was built in 98 and so i'm HOPING that no roof repairs or crazy fixups will be needed. Its got a nice little build in seats and fireplace in the backyard and the freeway is close enough that the distance shouldn't be too bad.

David said that he wished we would have never looked at house#2 and put an offer and wasted money on an inspector, and although I wish we could have saved the money, i definitely learned quite a bit. Looking at things with a naked eye is only a fraction of a houses story.

For valentines day this year, we were bums and went to see Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief. I just finished the fifth and last book this morning and David finished last week, so we were both excited to see how the movie of the first book played out. They completely changed the plot and took out a lot of the story ( I guess thats to be expected with how much was loaded into the book). My sweet David also suprised me with red roses yesterday morning and a box of chocolates and then this morning I found some white roses added to the group. Valentines Day with David has been so neat every year....he is always suprising me! Our first valentines day three years ago, he unexpectedly proposed to me. The second Valentines Day we ate at Cafe Rio and did taxes (ok, so that wasn't the coolest). The third Valentines day we went out to dinner, came home and i discovered balloons and heart all over our room. This year i was suprised with some chocolates and roses! Sorry for no pictures of valentines day!

Its the end of January...

And I apologize for neglecting my blog. Since school has started, I am rarely home and when I am home, all i want to do if veg-out and watch t.v. This semester is pretty much the last full semester before I graduate and it is the climax of everything. I am taking a class Monday-Wednesday-Friday for three hours each night, working in the schools 35 hours a week, working at Save the Family TUesday nights, babysitting every Friday night, and cleaning/doing laundry every Saturday..meanwhile my apartment continues to fall apart and we're still trying to find a house. We are putting another offer in on a house tonight and hope things work out because we're tired of searching along with everything else that has to be done. Wish us luck!

On a fun note, my wonderful sister in law is so talented and last years christmas she made me a stocking. She has made stockings for everyone in her family as well as her parents and I thought what a great idea! So i ordered one that I wanted to make for my mom (figured i'd start with her as she's had the junkiest stocking the longest and i knew just what stocking i wanted to make)...this one:

You see, my mom makes a few HUNDRED dozen of cookies every Christmas time and sells them to her customers. So when I think of Christmas and her, I think of the 4a.m.-1:ooa.m(the next day) hours that she does for about three weeks in December. When i opened the stocking kit i was pretty shocked at how much there was to do. I should have known that I have never even completed a cross-stitch kit, let alone a stocking kit. Sure hope I get help on this (hint hint Fawn :))

Weddings and Blackouts oh my!

Life has certainly not been dull over the last few weeks as school has started again, or atleast the elementary through high schools where I work. My first day back I realized just how much I missed being busy ALL day i mean literally working from 7:15-7:30p.m. I am crazy for wanting to stop my break early...i know.

About two weeks ago my sister in law Natalia got married and is now living up in Utah! Finally some sane relatives we can go visit up there and enjoy lots of wonderful trips to the quilted bear (a store filled with adorable home decorations in Provo). Here are some pictures from the wedding:

David with our niece Hailey...who has certainly acquired a piratey smile :)

Above: Rhys and Natalia leaving the building to start their honeymoon ;)

Below: the lady who designed the flowers and boquets professionally said that this cake is estimated to be around 2,000$. It was made by Fawn (my sister in law, brides sister) who has never made a fancy cake like this before. She is amazing needless to say.

Natalia with all of our nieces...so adorable

First Kiss as Husband and Wife

An another interesting note, last Tuesday I went to an ENT clinic in Mesa to do some voice evaluations where my supervisors sticks a camera down the throat of patients to look at their vocal folds and get pictures which the ENT doctor then diagnosis what the problem is. Mind you this is my fourth or fifth time going to this office and nothing grosses me out. The third patient came in with her family and I was in the doctors room with them, the doctor, my supervisor, and my friend who was another student clinician. I was leaning my back against the wall with my legs straight out (so i looked like a triangle) and listening to the docs feedback. After a few minutes the room started getting a darker tint and I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me with the weird lighting and warm temperature in the room. The room kept getting a darker blood red color and almost black and I thought to myself "I should go step out of the room and walk around...this is weird". I then thought "nah, you would look silly...your eyes have played tricks before (although never gotten this dark in a room)...you will be fine). The next thing I remember is my left cheek hurting a lot and me lying on the floor in a crumpled position with the doctor in front of my face asking if I was alright. SO EMBARRASING, right? So i was escorted to another room and drank some juice. First time passing out ever and it was the strangest feeling. I do have high blood pressure issues but this has been dealt with by medication. Only other conclusion I can draw with the help of others was that my legs were locked to long. Because I didn't know I was blacking out, as it had never happened before, I didn't know that I should have acted on that first thought to get up and walk around. My elbow was really bruised and still hurts and the back of my right need where i think the blood supply was cut off continues to throb and hurt. Hopefully there isn't a blockage forming there and thats whats been causing my high blood pressure!

Just thought i'd share a tidbit of my interesting last few weeks :)

L.I.F.E

The choice game for this evening was LIFE which David and I have never played together-and boy was the whole game hilarious. David chose to start the career path immediately (which you only get to choose lower paying careers). The first card David drew was a 30,000$ salary, and moments later, he landed on a "change career" spot. He was overjoyed at the thought of drawing a higher paying salary card and he said "wow, things couldn't get any better", but i laughed and said that would be so funny if you drew 20,000$ (the lowest paying amount)...to which he immediately picked up the 20,000$ card and we both laughed hysterically.

I however, the college girl that I am, proceeded to pick out (without looking) the lawyer card which makes 90,000$ (the second highest paying card you could get). I ended up only getting one baby along the way, and I bought the highest priced house for 800,000$. I maybe landed on 2 spots where I had to pay something and had three lawsuits in a row to which David owed me 100,000$ each time.

Lesson: Go to college! :)

The game was so funny as everything we landed on was so stereotypical of life with the paths we chose. David ended up only 40,000$ less than me in the end which was pretty good. Here are some pictures from our night :)

Notice all my 100,000 dollar bills (yellow)

Notice David's stack of loanes and little cash

These are a few of my favorite things

Christmas, as usual, was wonderful. I got many presents that I don't feel like I deserved. My wonderful mother bought me a sewing machine. When I was around 8 years old, my mom had me take sewing lessons from a lady down the street, and I learned how to sew jumpers, and all kinds of clothes. Since then, i've made shams and a quilt but little else and I have seen how so many people my age have sewed their own curtains, baby bedding, and quilts. Given that I once had sewing lessons, i feel like i'm able to do the very basic things and so I asked for a sewing machine, totally not expecting it. Thanks mom! I will definitely put the machine to use, especially as I move into a house in the next few months and try to personalize my house.

My sweet David got me a nice saute teflon pan (since our other once was getting so scratched up and we were probably eating flakes of poison), a beautiful rotating spice rack, swaroski crystal necklace and with his brother an ipod (to name some of the things).

David got a 26 piece knife set (since our knives that we "borrowed" from his moms house after we first got married are so dull that they work about the same as a butter knife....needless to say, we really needed knives), a paintball mask, glove, and computer chair.

We spent the morning opening presents with my siblings and then spent the late afternoon and evening at David's parents house with his siblings and their kids.

Thursday (Christmas Eve), we spent the day up near strawberry/payson, enjoying the abundance of snow that was up there due to a major storm they had two days prior. We loaded up trucks of snow to suprise David's brother's family with their six kids, and built a snowman and snow slide for the kids. We spent a little time going sledding but this year, was somewhat disappointing as all of the areas we usually sled at were closed off. It was so wonderful to be out in the forest with such clear air, and to see the beauty of Arizona outside the dirt hills and cacti. Thanks Dad Bunzell for throwing the trip together.

Sorry its been so long since my last post, haven't had much besides finals, finals, and more finals going on :) David takes his last one on Tuesday and I take my last one on Wednesday and am definitely looking forward to that.

This past sunday some of my inlaws got together and we made cakeballs and little candies that you make with melted rolos, pretzels, and pecans (if you want the recipe, let me know). Both things were so easy to make and turned out delicious!

The housing search continues to be frustrating as we've been dealing with a good broker but a realtor who has been taking an abundance of time getting back to us. We are praying that the timing will fall into place as we don't need to be out until the end of march but must purchase a home before the end of april to get in on the tax credit.

Lastly, I want to mention how grateful I am for my calling in nursery. This was a really tough change for me to leave the kids in the 13-14 year old sunday school class who I grew to love immensly. But it has been so fun to be with the little ones, to see their love for learning and the energy that I wish I had :) They are the ones that have been away from heaven for the shortest amount of time and you can't but help love their quick to forgive abilities. I guess Heavenly Father knows we all need changes, as much as we don't want them. He knows that we need help from these little ones to soften our nature, as much as they need us for food, love, warmth and shelter.

Thanksgiving 2009

This weekend has been a long awaited, VERY much needed one. I feel so burnt out from school and work and school and work etc etc. Part of me dreaded Thanksgiving this year for one reason: I knew my husband was leaving with his dad and brother to go elk hunting and there was a large possibility that they wouldn't return until Monday if they hadn't caught an elk. I hate being home alone at night, and 4-5 days of that wasn't all that appealing. I kept my fingers crossed and I know others did too that they would come back the next day (friday) and they did!

On Friday I got a text from my mother in law saying that they had shot a 6 point bull (male) elk, and aside from the great deals I got during black friday, that was the best news i'd heard ALL day. The boys returned around 1a.m. and have 350lbs of meat waiting for them. Here are some of their victory photos:

As you can see, even the elk was so happy it was able to offer itself for sustenance that it stuck its tongue out! Great job boys!

Thanksgiving itself was great.....enjoyed a wonderful meal at my inlaws house and got to eat some yummy pumpkin pie at my mom's house.

I got up with my sister at 4a.m. to go black friday shopping and there was one gift I wanted SO badly at Walmart and a lady snatched the last kind of what i wanted literally 10 seconds before I got there. I was a little distraught and there were SO many people in Walmart that i was frustrated and ready to leave. Luckily, my mom was at a nearby Walmart and was able to snatch exactly one of what I wanted-thanks for saving the day mom! I would say what I got but "Santa" is giving us this gift and incase my husband decides to read our blog, I don't want him to find out. Needless to say our black friday wasn't as productive as we thought it would be, but still had a great time enjoying the early morning tradition.

Finals are coming up between now and the next three weeks. One class I am especially concerned about passing (getting a B) and if i can't pass this, I will have to retake the class next year, and won't be able to graduate this summer as I had planned. Please keep me in your prayers! Hope everyone had a wonderful thanksgiving!