Buh-bye

I'm off to the reunion! We're going to have a blast. Tyler will join on Friday evening, so I'm going to miss him. We'll try to save some fun for him. :) This week has been great, as lots of the fam has arrived. I really feel so lucky to have married into such a fun and wonderful family- I could not have hand-picked a better family to join! Tyler's internship started Monday, and despite still dealing with a little leftover flu-ish stuff, he's doing well and liking it.

I went rock climbing yesterday with my mom. Yeah, picture that. Have you ever been rock climbing with your mom? We had so much fun. Tim and Kenny were there with us after a little bit, and I decided it was more fun without strong boys showing off how high they could get- I enjoyed laughing and falling with my mom much more.

Anyway, I just think family is the greatest. I have THE 2 best ones, despite what you may think about yours. No rock.

p.s. not sure why the only picture I have from the last Andersen reunion with everyone in it is a silly picture... but I guess that represents us best anyway.

Houston=

-family
-food
-hot
-wet
-swim
-tan
-sleeping in
-whataburger shakes
-blue bell ice cream
-zero need for lotion
-ice water
-movies

We are just having toooo much fun here! It makes me so excited to think that a year from now, we'll be moving here for good. Crazy. It's been a party for quite a few days now, as lots of Tyler's extended family has been trickling in for the reunion, which officially starts Wednesday! We stay up late playing games and talking and laughing our bums off and eating lots and lots of food. And taking pics like this... why do boys turn everything into a competition??

 I have to say... hubby is pretty darn impressive. Check out that air! He did make the dunk, by the way :)

 Hard core face, Mitch!

This picture's awesome too. They were dunking for hours! Tyler was f.r.i.e.d. The girls were content to give scores and catch some rays.

Gabby and Natty are to my right, keeping me company while the boys were maniacs! Those legs need some serious sun. Guess I'm in the right place!

Tyler woke up feeling sick yesterday, and spent the whole day feeling nauseous and gross and throwing up. I thought maybe it was something he ate, but when he spiked a fever of 102 that afternoon, I knew it couldn't have just been that. Thank goodness for sweet brothers who hold and honor the Priesthood who were able to give Tyler a blessing. He is feeling much better today and even ventured off to work for orientation. What a trooper. I'm so glad he had a week off to relax a bit before his internship started! He works so hard and I'm so proud of him. Plus, Tyler looks really really handsome in his work clothes... he makes business casual look good!

wii when toom owe ab ewe tah

You just go ahead and figure out that title! We are finally in Houston! Not that it has taken us this long, we're just still happy about it. :) Even though we said we would take it slow getting here, once we got in the car we just wanted to get out! So when we left Moab on Saturday night, we made it to Farmington, NM and spent the night there, and then drove the rest of the way on Sunday. Yes, the REST of the way. 18 hours I believe. It was ridiculous. But it was so worth it to get here! We spent time with both our families on Memorial Day, and we were glad to be here for that. Anyway, here are some pics from our Moab adventures!

Above is our campsite. We got to Moab around 8 pm on Friday, but since it was Memorial Day weekend, Moab was absolutely packed with people. It was insane. Not one open space at any of the nearby campsites! We drove around forever trying to find something. After a brainstorming dinner at Wendy's, we decided to try going further out of town than Arches or Canyonlands. We went south of Moab to the national park that's pretty close to Ken's Lake and found a spot there a bit after 11. Yes, we were campsite hunting for over 3 hours! It was crazy. *Note: Ken's Lake was hilarious. It was dark when we were searching for a campsite so we didn't see it until the next morning... pretty sure Ken just decided he wanted something named after him so he dug a lame hole and filled it with water. It's so man-made and funny-looking. Poor Ken.*


About to begin our jeeping adventures on Fins 'n' Things.


Yeah, we drove down that. And made a white mark similar to the ones already there! Thank goodness for the hitch or that mark would have been made by the bumper.


Austin was a really good and cautious driver (possibly because that's their daily commuter and not a vehicle specifically for those trails)!




Check out the angle... stuff was flying from the back to the front of the car! It felt so funny.

 A quick lunch of PB&Js before hitting the trail to Delicate Arch

 Proud of our lunch-making skills! :)

 That hike was a lot more difficult than I remembered... maybe it was in part because we went in the hottest hours of the day?!?

It was so fun to be there with Austin and Giselle! We had a great time. After we hiked, we drove back to our campsite. We decided it was much too hot to build a fire, and we were all exhausted, so we just kind of packed up and left! Our plan was to stay until Sunday, but I was glad we left when we did. The wind really picked up on our way out and I was glad not to be sleeping in a tent that night.

So that was our Moab trip! We had a blast. We've had a great week in Houston, but more about that later. I feel pretty accomplished just catching up this much!

In and then out

Now that we're pretty settled in, we are going to be packing up and heading out! Good thing we found a place for everything, just to take stuff out of its place and put it in the car. But we are so excited to be in Houston, so it's all worth it. We're also taking our camping gear because we're stopping in Moab for the weekend with Austin and Giselle! That will be tons of fun. Our plan is to hike a bit, play tennis a bit, and even go jeeping (is that how you say that?), which I've never done. Austin calls it "the 2 mph ride that's more thrilling than sky-diving" so I'm thinkin' it'll be awesome. We played 3 sets of tennis with them last night... 3 SETS, the last of which ended in a tie-breaker! Let's just say we were all exhausted by the end. But it was great.

There's not really much going on besides leaving... it's weird the things you have to think about when you're leaving your house for 2+ months. Tomorrow morning I'll be throwing out all the food that would go bad in that time period, and making sure there's nothing lying around that would leave us with a nasty "welcome home" stench. If you'd like some oranges (cuties) or milk or strawberry jam, there's no way we'll be able to finish it by the time we leave, so come and get it!

Sometimes we are goofy.

And I love it.

A little TLC never hurt anyone

We've never had lots of TV channels, but in this new apartment we have more than ever before. There's only one that I really like though- TLC! I've watched a few episodes of Extreme Couponing and it's awesome.

We are only a week-ish away from Houston! Well, the long drive, then Houston. :) But I'm actually looking forward to that! Tyler and I love road trips together. We read books and just talk forever. Once we get there, Tyler will start his internship and I'll start my next online classes. We are just so excited to spend time with our families and have some warm weather! I've had enough of this cold rain.

Not much goin' on here other than that. Just need to say that Tyler is the best- I'm so grateful for an understanding husband who is so sweet to take care of me when I'm not feeling well!

We are all moved out! Now the project is getting everything organized in the new place. We just love it so much though! So this is the fun part for us. We ran the dishwasher for the first time with our dishes in it the other day... such a beautiful sound! :)

I have been all about garlic and pasta lately... I'm trying this recipe tonight along with these, and I'm pretty sure it'll be delicious. I'm watching Fabulous Cakes as I work on organizing our movies and books- I love cake shows! They are so impressive. There's no way I could ever make cakes like that, but it's sure fun to watch! Makes me want to eat cake too.

Pictures of the new place to come... we love it!! I think I'll go find some more dishes to wash.

Happy happy birthday, Tyler dear!

Today is Tyler's birthday!! Hooray! Our Primary sang to him, and they inserted the word "teacher" instead of "children." It was pretty funny. Even though he's 24, my hubby's a kid at heart! :)

24 reasons I love him on his 24th birthday:

1. insane good looks
2. he always sings, but never the right lyrics (his are way better)
3. he works so hard and is always doing something productive
4. he is super-strong, especially his legs
5. always has a good answer for everything
6. great laugh, especially when something funny happens unexpectedly
7. his first question whenever I drop something is, "Are you okay?" So much better than "What did you break?" :)
8. in the mornings when he's tired, he will brush his teeth while he's in the shower
9. he runs super-fast
10. he loves Cool Ranch Doritos just as much as me
11. he will eat anything I make and claims to love it even if it's nasty
12. he pushes me to do new and challenging things
13. he has great taste in home decor and actually wants a say in the things I put up
14. he is way better than I am at tennis (I only really love this when we're on the same team)
15. he loves his family
16. he's really good at responding with the right commend even when he's not listening :)
17. he gets really cuddly and lovey-dovey when he's half asleep
18. he rarely complains about the chick flicks I choose for us to watch
19. he is a gentleman
20. he is a great older brother and will be an amazing dad
21. except for on the basketball court, he lets me call him any cheesy pet name I want
22. he's always trying to be better
23. he is competitive but respectful
24. he loves me

Happy Birthday my love! Can't wait til you're 100 years old so I'm not so limited by listing just 24 reasons to love you. The plan for celebrating: PF Chang's (thanks to Tyler's parents for giving us a gift card), brownies and ice cream, and a movie. Probably not a chick flick tonight, since it is his birthday, not mine.

This was the sign I made him for his birthday 2 years ago. He doesn't say birth day, so the typo was planned :)

The good, the bad, and the ugly

Good: talking to our two favorite missionaries on Sunday! Heidi and Jeff are both doing so great, and it made our day to talk with them.
Bad: we only got to talk for one hour. Booo.

Good: it rained all day yesterday! Not typical for Utah- reminded me of Houston and made me excited to go home.
Bad: we happened to be moving a lot of our stuff yesterday. In the rain.

Good: found an awesome ice cream cake recipe I'd like to try for Tyler's birthday- it's tomorrow!
Bad: since Tyler's not a big party person, we'll be forced to eat it all by ourselves. Oh darn. :)

Good: we moved lots of stuff over to the new place yesterday, including clothes!
Bad: we moved lots (but not all) of our stuff over to the new place yesterday, including clothes!
Ugly: my outfit today, thanks to our efficiency yesterday and my forgetting to bring clothes back with me for today! Luckily there was a (not matching) skirt and a shirt in my "needs mending" pile- hopefully no one has noticed that's where I grabbed them from!

We've got lots happening at our place right now... couldn't even think of a comprehensive title to describe it all. I am almost done with my first Independent Study class! I'm just waiting for my instructor to grade some assignments and then I can take the final. I've loved learning about the current leaders of the Church... they're all just amazing!

We're also in the process of moving. Very slowly, but surely. Most of what we're doing right now is cleaning the new place in preparation for new carpet and paint coming in this weekend and next week. So exciting! We love the apartment we're moving to, and are excited to have a little more space (and a DISHWASHER)!

The car is finally totally done being fixed. After we got it back on Friday, we noticed a few things they had neglected or not completely finished. So I spent 3 hours with the good folks at Martin's Collision while they fixed the little scratches and rattles. It's so nice to have our own car! That was a long month of rental cars... not cool. We're glad to be back to normal, whatever that is. :)

Countdown to Houston: 28 days. YESSSSSS