Master Bathroom Remodel, My 30th, St.George, & meet the new family member

I was at the home show a few months ago and saw this quartz countertop that I really liked and wanted for the kitchen, but didn't think Ryan would because he was so set on granite and it would probably be out of our price range. Below is a picture of what I wanted. Ryan was at a kitchen remodel job and they had their old countertop and sink in the garage, so he asked what they were planning on doing with it and they said they were saling it. Ryan thought they'd probably be asking too much but asked anyways, and about choked when they told him they only wanted $350!!!!! He said "SOLD!" He called me up and said I needed to come look at to see if I like it. I was pleasantly surprised that it was the exact thing I wanted for the kitchen at an AMAZING price! We paid and hauled it away that day. Now we just have to wait until we have the money for new cabinets!

My master bathroom is FINALLY finished! I LOVE it! Here is a before picture of the tiny old master bath. The master "not walk-in" closet was terrible. If you hung clothes on both sides, you couldn't even walk thru the clothes to see what you had. Since we changed one of the small bedrooms into a true walk-in closet, we knocked the wall down between the closet and the bathroom to make an awesome master bathroom.

Shadow Ridge Kitchen and Bath did an amazing job with the cabinetry and travartine countertop.

Thanks to working for a plumber, we got amazing deals on all of the plumbing and didn't spend nearly as much as we were planning on! Yeah!
Wagoner Glass installed this amazing frameless shower enclosure and door. I love that the door can swing either in or out. Ryan did almost everything in this bathroom himself; taking out the wall, his dad helped him with the rough plumbing, framing, patching and texturing the sheetrock, painting, glazing, electical, tile work and grout (we decided on a complicated design, and he rocked it), installed some of the plumbing fixtures, I had some of the guys I work with do some too. Ryan is amazing at anything he puts his mind to. We both are in love with this bathroom, it is our favorite place to relax.

So...last week my boss walks into the office carrying this adorable kitten. We have strays all the time around the office, but must of them are so wild they won't even look at you. He said this one just walked right up to him and rubbed up against his leg, so he thought I needed to see her. Well, it was love at first site. I fed her, gave her some water, loved her, and she fell asleep on my desk while I worked for the rest of the day. Needless to say, she went home with me, of course after making sure it was ok with Ryan. He was hesitant, but he liked her. She is growing in Cessna, it happened faster than I thought, but the first couple of days was a little worrisome. She gets along great with Ivy.
Funny story about how she got her name-Hey Hey. We were having a difficult time coming up with a name for her and everytime she did something wrong or I was trying to get her attention, I would say, "Hey, Hey." Our friend John was like, you should just name her Hey Hey. Too funny. We started calling her that, what we thought would just be temporary, but it just kind of stuck. She is SO cuddly, playful, and lovey and is a mix between my two favorite breeds: Calico and Tabby (tigger kitty as I call them).

I turned the big 3 - 0 on June 8th and before I chopped my hair off I wanted to get pictures done, so I went to Girls Night Out with Anniemations Photography and got some great pictures taken with my Mom. The rest are getting mailed today and I can't wait to see all of them!

Our yearly girls Tuachan trip just happend to fall the day after my birthday. Me, my sister, mom, 2 aunts, and 4 cousins went this year. My aunt and cousin from Calfornia flew in to go with us. We had a lot of fun. Grease was the first night and was a big dissappointment. It felt high school production quality instead of what you expect from Tuachan. But I think they spent so much time working out the kinks and perfecting The Little Mermaid that they didn't spend enough time on Grease. The Little Mermaid was AMAZING! It is my all time favorite out of all the shows I've ever seen. I LOVED it!

Friday we spent the day in Zion's and hiked the Emerald Pools hike. I think we have the record for making a 1.5 mile hike take the longest. Everyone wanted to stop all the time and take pictures, but we got some fun shots and it's alll about having fun, enjoying the journey, and not caring about the destination or how long it takes to get there.

The group at the Upper Emerald Pools.

Choppy, Choppy

Say Bye to the lovely locks- 14 inches donated to Locks of Love
I never thought I would like this short hair as much as I do! A total of 16 inches once is was finished.

April & the first part of May

I've been doing a lot of this in my almost completed master bathroom. We just got the vanity yesterday, it still needs to be installed and then we need to pick a countertop. We are also still waiting on the glass for the shower to be done. It's done enough to enjoy it though!

I painted this for my dad for his birthday. I've started enjoying painting on canvas with acrylic. I'm not very good at coming up with a design, but if I find something I like, I just copy it.

He loved it.
Ryan got invited to the Lodi Sequentials. The organizers only invite 40 of the top skydivers in the country. It was awesome that he got invited. This has been something he's wanted to do for a long time, but never thought he'd be good enough to be invited. He was pretty excited to be jumping with people he's looked up to in the skydiving community. We drove down Thursday, it was an 11 hour drive. They were supposed to jump Friday-Sunday, but Friday & Saturday got weathered out because of 30 mph winds. Finally on Sunday they were able to get 9 jumps in, 4 of which was a friendly 8 way competition with 5 teams. It's like the 4 way that Ryan won gold with, but you do it with 8 people. Ryan loved every minute of it. It was fun to see my Rockwell guys on each team. Kyle's team won with the most points completed. 5 of the jumps were the planned 40 ways. It is so cool to see the formations form from the gound and see all of them land in a tiny landing area. It was a thrill just watching them all land, ok and a little scary! Below are the 40 way peeps dirt diving one of the jumps, it was a peace sign. Ryan's in the center with his long hair, long black t-shirt with his jump suit hanging from his waist.
Because of the weather being crazy on Friday, we went into San Francisco and met up with some of the skydivers, we didn't do much but hang out. We then went to one of the jumpers apartments that's in the nice part of Oakland and had dinner and then went to have a huck jam in the San Fran. Tunnel. It was so much fun and a little intimidating flying with the amazing flyers. There were about 13 of us flying in the huck jam.
My uncle Richard only lives an hour away from the drop zone, so I was so excited to be able to stay with them and spend some quality time with his family. I spent all day Saturday with Richard & Lynne. There was a wine festival in Livermore and I enjoyed getting to taste all of the wine from that area. They were for the most part all delicious. They sent me home with 4 of my favorites that they just happened to have in their wine cellar at home. I can't wait to visit them again. I really bonded with them this trip and loved all the quality time I got with just the three of us.
Last weekend Ryan and I cleared out the tv/entertainment room and moved it all up into the front room so we could begin remodeling. I can't wait to get rid of the white primer and the Nasty carpet! I bet I have an ant farm underneath it. There's a lot we have to do before we tear out the carpet, but it's going to be gross.
I was pleasantly surprised how good everything looked up in our front room. Some of the things will be staying in this room because we plan on getting a huge sectional for the room downstairs.My friend Ericka had a birthday party and I thought since she's an artist it would be fun to do a collaborate art piece for her. I painted the background and the tree and then each of our skydiving friends painted a circle. It turned out amazing and she loved it!

Tomorrow is my Polynesian Dance Revue. I am so excited this year because my class has an amazing song for our Tahitian dance, plus we all will have the same costume, AND it's a new type of costume that our group has never had before. It's going to be AMAZING! Below is a Sneak peak picture of the costume, but we will be wearing a black tank and skirt. Non of us are daring enough to wear a coconut bra. The thing around the neck is actually our head dress.

February & March

We started remodel on the master bathroom. I am SO excited for it to be done. Besides flooring in the office, walk-in closet, and hallway this is the last thing to be done upstairs! We tore the wall down between the tiny master bath and the tiny master closet to enable us to have a 2 person soaking tub with seperate shower, a nice sized vanity, and of course a toilet. Ryan's been working hard. We've had to re-do a lot of plumbing, the subfloor, sheet rock, texturing, frame and install the tub, paint, get everything ready to tile, tile (what's happening currently). We are almost done with the tile. It's going to amazing when it's finished.

February 16, Ivy turned 2. We had another fun Birthday Party with her siblings. Since she loves course a'lure I thought it would be fun to have a cake made about that. It turned out way cute. More of the siblings came this year and we loved getting to meet more of them.

Buddy, (who is 66 pounds, he was the biggest one there), Owen (Ivy's look a-like), Ivy, Ruby, and Annie. We missed the mom Lucy, and two brothers Bear Dog, and Chaps. I also found out that Ruby's parents have contact with the Dad-he will be invited next year. My parents also came. A few hours after the party was over, I got a phone call from my Dad. He just wanted to tell me how fun he thought the party was and had a good time watching and playing with all of Ivy's siblings. I thought it was cute he enjoyed it so much to call and let me know. Yeah, I know y'all think I'm crazy and need to have human kids, but that's just now for me. I had a fun girls night with my skydiving girlies. We made "pimp glasses" and played games. It was a bunch of fun. Here's how mine turned out. Oh and yes it does make wine taste better. haha

On March 6, Ryan turned 30!!!! I can't make too much fun because it'll be me 3 months. We went to Toad's. We played arcade games, laser tag, mini golf, and hung out with friends. It was a lot of fun.
While Ryan was gone last weekend in Mesquite to train for USPA Skydiving Nationals, Ryan's parents, my parents, and I built our garden boxes. We planned, readied the ground, purchased the supplies, built, installed, leveled, and put bark on the paths in 3.5 hours. We were all surprised how fast we got it done. I did this as a surprise for Ryan because they needed to get done and I knew he wouldn't have the time to do them. He LOVED them and was way excited that he didn't have to do them himself. The Wednesday before we did them he told his dad that he didn't think we'd be able to have a garden this year, because he didn't know when he would have the time to make our boxes. Little did he know a plan was already in place to get them done. It was a perfect surprise.

It's been a long time.....Update

This picture is of me "Genie Flying" (my signature move in the sky & tunnel) with Jake Jensen "Sit Flying" in Chicago.If any of you wonder what our kids would look like if we had any...no need to wonder anymore. Ryan's nephew Ian looks exactly like Ryan did when he was little. This was on Thanksgiving, Ian like Ryan's shoes and beanie and just had to give them a try.

We now have all the decorations up in our master bedroom. I am so glad to have it done. If you look through the open door into the hallway, you can see the most current project almost done. All we need is the carpet!
Jake turned 30 in December so we had an 80's themed birthday party for him with all our skydiving friends. I invited Rachel and Shawn. It was hilarious to see everyone's costumes.
Our annual girlfriend Christmas Party was at my house again. We had our Henna girl Harmony there, massage girl Brooke, and yummy soup with bread bowls.

• We were the first to discover a house fire at 2:30 in the morning. Called 911 and Ryan walked into the burning house to wake the people up and get them out, while a police officer just stood there and stared at the fire. He arrived about 3 minutes after we called 911. I think I actually told dispatch that there WAS a police officer on site but he was just standing there doing nothing. Funny. THAT was a crazy night. Here's the link to the story from KSL http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=13940530
• Tax Season has started, so I am busier than ever.
  
• Mesquite was amazing! The 65 degree weather felt like it was actually 75.
• Ryan won the Blue Skies Boogie's, Skyphoria Film Festival for his film "Cirque Du SoLame" That involved going through 9 years of footage (about 90 DV tapes), figuring out everything needed to create a movie on Final Cut (an editing software for apple), hours and hours of time locked in the office (he wouldn't let me see any of it until it was finished), days of editing, a bunch of laughter (his friends Chase and Nick helped him, I would hear the music for the video and them cracking up which was a sign that the movie was going to be amazing) and of course, it was. For winning, the owner of Skydive Mesquite, Brad Jessey, is going to produce it so it can be available for purchase on the internet. Ryan will get the profits.
The upstairs hallway is done! One more thing off the long remodeling list. Once we take out the master bath tub, toilet, and sub floor, we will be ready for carpet in the upstairs! Wahoo! I can't wait.