MY (emphasis on my) Piano

When we moved into our new apartment, we actually had space for a piano.  I'm ashamed to admit this, but I obsessed about getting one and threw a temper tantrum or two because people weren't cooperating with me. Okay, so maybe i'm being a little over dramatic.  I don't care. After all, this is about getting me my own piano.

Tim and I drove to see several and actually got a free entertainment center out of one visit. But... not piano yet.

My dad is "the piano man." No, not the Billy Joel type, but an actual piano mover, tuner, fixer uper--the works.  I didn't think he'd let me buy one from him and I didn't want a piano out on loan, I wanted a piano to be actually owned by me.

Finally, he had one with me in mind and he actually offered to sell it to me.  I'm sure he gave me a killer deal, but why should that even matter. I was going to buy my own piano.  I would finally be able to practice at home and maybe even teach at home. This was going to be good.

Yup. it certainly was good, is good, and will continue to be good.  Ryan, Tim, Dad and a neighbor helped haul it up our ridiculously steep stairs and now it is nestled against my front wall. It's gorgeous and even sounds gorgeous for an upright. I'm in love... :)

My dad videoed the first moments of me playing my new piano in my apartment.

Tour of Our First Apartment

Below are pictures of the studio apartment that I used in creating a craigslist add for someone to take over our lease because we found a two bedroom apartment for 50 more bucks a month. Enjoy the tour.

Kitchen sink and cupboards.

Another view of kitchen. Grandma Brower gave me
her butcher block which gave us a lot more counter space.

Kitchen oven, fridge, and pantry. We put the microwave on top of the fridge.

this is the front of the apartment building as seen from across the street.

Our living room and dining room. We had afan in the window because 

the air conditioning didn't work well. It was sooo hot all the time.

A view coming from the kitchen of our closet space that was to the side of the living room

This view is looking out in front of the closet area toward the kitchen.
Didn't I do a good job with making our little space cute? I miss its cuteness.

looking at our bed from the front door

This would be the front door and our little office which
is at the end of the bed and to the side of the closet space.

Our bathroom door was right next to our bed .

I think our bathroom was pretty cute, too.

There was a lot of storage space behind the bathroom door.
Look at all of the drawers! Oh, and our tub only fit one person.

Cruisin'

The week we got married, we spent everyday in our new little studio apartment just enjoying each other. At the time we counted that as our honeymoon.  Tim's parents had a better idea.  They bought us tickets to go on a week long cruise to Mexico. 

Mom and Dad Huntsman, Aunt Carla and Uncle Gary, and Tim and I had fun going on vacation together. The airplane flight to L.A. being an exception. I don't know about anyone else, but I was so motion sick that I threw up in the little complimentary paper bag. I feel bad for the guy sitting next to Tim and me.  If I were him I would have joined in the yacking.  He acted like he didn't see, but he could have been pretending out of embarrassment. I thought for sure that the cruise would make me sick, too, but it didn't bother me one bit. Thank Heavens! 

You may be wondering: "How would going on one's honeymoon with one's relatives be fun?" Let me explain. Each couple had their own room and did their own thing a lot of the time, but we did get together to eat, play poker (yup, I learned how to play Texas Hold 'Em on my honeymoon), and/or sight see.  I really enjoyed getting to know my new relatives.

We were on the Carnival Splendor. That was the name of our ship. It was massive.  If memory serves me right, I think it had 9 levels--my favorite being the lido deck. This was where all the food was... all day long. We'd already payed for it with the price of our tickets which made it a buffet 24/7. Sigh. I miss the lido deck. Also, it had a covering that could come over the top of the ship if we hit foul weather (which was 80% of the time). I didn't get a sun burn or a tan because of almost constant cloud cover.

There were shows in an auditorium like room everyday. There was a karaoke room. There was dancing and gambling. We enjoyed swimming in hot tubs and sliding down slides into the pool. Though, I did not enjoy having salt water go up my nose. The pools were filled with ocean water. It was very green of them, but uncomfortable to my sinuses. Yuck.

On the top deck, they had a miniature golf course. Tim and I played through a few times. There was also a sand bag tossing game of which I was horrible at playing.  Tim of course was almost flawless at it, like he is with most games. :)

At night, they'd play a movie on a big screen in front of the patio of the lido deck. Tim and I watched the latest Terminator movie while sitting in a hot tub and then later while laying on beach chairs. Both situations were awesome.

The walls in our apartment complex were paper thin which means we could hear everything our neighbors were doing and they could hear everything we were doing.  On the other hand, the walls surrounding our room on the ship were soooo thick. We could be as loud as we wanted to be while we watched movies or did other things...if you catch my drift. Sorry, I couldn't help myself. this was our honey moon after all, haha.

Moving on, dinner was to die for. We could order anything we wanted and they would bring it to us in a five course meal fashion. By the end of the week we had grown to really like our waiters. They were a couple of funny, charismatic people. belowt is a video of dinner time on the cruise ship, Our waiters and waitresses did a different dance and song each night. It was very entertaining.

As for see the sights, we had several port days which meant that we could go to shore and explore Mexico. We stopped in Puerto Vallarta, Cabo San Lucas, and Mazatlan. Each place was jam packed with little kids and old ladies trying to sell you something. Even the taxi drivers were in on it.  We had one tell us he would drive us to the playa (beach), but instead he dropped us off in front of Di Jewelers. Eventually we found an honest taxi driver . He took us to a nice pretty much empty plot of beach. There was a little Mexican family playing in the sand, but other than that it was just us.  We road the waves as they flushed onto the shore. Tim was more adventurous than I and he went pretty far out and caught some big waves.  I was content with being slightly pushed around. After splashing in the water, I ended up getting some shell bracelets and 2 sun dresses from a lady who we suspect was in cahoots with the bar above the beach.  Most everyone, it seemed, wanted to sell us something and they know how to work the ethos, too. It is a lot harder to say no to a kid or grandma than a legit businessman for some reason.  Tim was really good at bartering, though, so we got pretty good deals.... I think, haha. 

Mom Huntsman had bought tickets for her and Carla to go horseback riding in Mazatlan, but for some reason, Tim and I ended up with them. We rode a bus and passed through some really poor looking ghettos to get us to the horses. Surrounding us as we rode our horses were little huts made out of branches and people surviving somehow in boxes and the like. It was an eye-opening experience. This was a completely different Mexico than we saw in each tourist-ville. On the ride, we were accompanied by armed policeman to prevent any harm or robbery from happening to us along the way. We were in the thick of it. Albeit we saw loads of litter and poverty, the land was beautiful, luscious and green. Plus, I got to ride a horse! That, in and of  itself, was a party.

In Cabo San Lucas, I had my first experience snorkeling.  It was traumatic, let me tell you!  I'm not a strong swimmer, first of all. To go along with that, I couldn't seem to master breathing through that tube.  I stupidly thought that clasping my teeth around the mouth piece would keep water out. No, no, no, no, no. Clasping my mouth around the mouthpiece would have made more sense. I apparently was a one woman show to everyone on the beach as they laughed at my shrieking and flailing about. Oh, and trying to walking in plastic flippers.... that is difficult.  I'm sure that aided in the hilarity of my performance, haha.  I can laugh, now, as I look back on this memory, but it was not funny at the time. Eventually, I got the hang of breathing and Tim pulled me along in the water so that I could see some crazy colorful fish. I saw a few and that was enough for me. Maybe one day I'll try it again. Hopefully, I don't epically fail like I did that day.

The moral of this story is that cruises are fantastic and I want to go an more of them (them being plural on purpose). MORE, please. :D

      

My Timmy

There once was a boy named Tim Huntsman. I fell in love with him. We got married and are now living happily forever after. The end. :)

We met before Tim's mission at a young single adult sand volleyball activity and we hung out a few times before he left, but we didn't write each other until he was about to come home. When he was finally home, he was trying to decide whether or not he should go back to BYU or stay and attend BSU. Eventually, he came to a decision. He stayed! I'd like to think I had a lot to do with this, though I suppose it doesn't really matter. What matters is that, even though I was nervous about letting another guy (i'd dated some not-so-good guys) into my life, he was patient enough to allow me time to fall in love with him. Tim got home from his mission at a time when I was recovering from some stupid choices that I'd made. I had some trust issues, but he waited it out (it being all the time it took for our relationship to blossom). I'll always be grateful for that.

After months of spending almost every waking moment together (watching movies, doing homework, going to school, attending institute classes, going to church, eating scrumptious triple-decker pb and j sandwiches, playing and singing music, talking on the phone until the wee hours of the morning, hanging out with friends and family... and the list goes on) we went on a stroll from Riva Ridge Way (the street he lived on) to Reutzel Dr (the street I lived on... yes we were neighbors growing up and didn't even know it). We continued walking down Ruetzel while we held hands and talked. I don't remember what we talked about, but our chit chat isn't the point of this story. The good stuff is coming up, though, I promise. Anyways, we walked and walked and walked and when we reached Rushmore Way. Tim got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I thought he was joking at first and asked in awe, "Are you serious?" Only seconds later, positive that my boyfriend was wanting to become my fiancé, excitement burst from my heart to my mouth and I literally screamed "YES!!!!"

We kept our engagement a secret for one day. Well actually, I think we each told one person. He told his sister and I told my nephew, Gabe (he couldn't talk at the time so I knew my secret was safe with him).  Other than that, we wanted to have a day of bliss just to ourselves.

The next day, he came to pick me up for a car ride. On the way to somewhere (I was clueless), Tim told me about his experience in the temple. I'm not going to go into details about that, but you can know that it made me bawl tears of joy.  I couldn't stop crying. I felt so loved and wanted. This engagement felt soooo right! Tim was planning on driving to the volleyball court where we first met and officially proposing (ring and all) there, but he felt bad about continuing to drive as I was crying. Instead, he pulled over and whipped out the ring. Again he asked me to marry him. This made me cry even harder. :) Hugs and kisses happened... it was a beautiful moment... and then we went to show and tell to our parents and everyone we could think of. 

The only other day in my life that was better than the two days I've just described would be our wedding day.

We were married in the Boise temple on the 27th of March 2010. Family and friends came to the ceremony and witnessed us being sealed for time and all eternity.  There was not a dry eye in the room. The spirit was so sweet.

I now get to be with my best friend for ever--learning and growing. I'm the luckiest girl EVER!  

  

My Version of "My Father's Hands"

My father is the man

Who has loved me

All my life.

Since before I can remember

He's worked hard for his

Family and wife.

Though his body has been through

A day of pain and bombard,

When he played upon the piano

There were times when he played just as hard.

I loved to see

My father's hands

Zealously climb up and down

The keys.

In my heart

The more I wished

To be like him

And do all I could

Just to please.

"Why do you play the piano so much?"

"The more I play

The better I get

And the more fun it is

For every finger to touch."

My father's hands

Have taught me

To work hard and yet

To have fun.

So now when I play

the piano

And feel my fingers run.

I think of

my father's hands

and I am thankful.

Writing

I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...

My hands move swiftly.

Scratching with a pen, I write

Lovely words of fantasy.

Alive in ink on the sheets.

I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...I love to write...

On My Swing

Chilled mountain forest

Encircles my body, I'm

Breathing it all in