two favorites as of late

It has officially been over a month now since I have bitten my nails and this time, I've had no reason (a.k.a. a wedding) to quit. I've done it all on my own. Determined to kick this habit once and for all. My biggest motivation, I haven't had a single cold sore since I stopped which is a huge deal as this used to be an occurrence at least every other week with a weeks worth of healing in-between. Somehow through the stress of school over the last little while, I haven't given in and I'm counting my blessings for that because so many times I was tempted to. I have even filed them a time or two in the last month which has NEVER happened. The best part about it all is getting to paint them! Before, they were too short and stubbly that anytime I tried I would immediately remove it and think to myself, "what are you doing, trying to attract people to those hideous looking nails?! Not a good plan." I've always wanted to try a colored french tip and I love it! My first favorite thing as of late. And my second, those gorgeous heart stacked rings that Nic got me for Christmas. I'm in love with them. Especially the N+M one. ♥ 

Now I get daily reminders of him on not one hand but two. 

MY FAVORITE. 

a weekend to remember

 

These darn weekends go so fast. Sometimes, I think all it takes is one blink and its over. But its nearly Wednesday already and I can't help but be surprised at how fast the past two days have gone. We had such a great time with my mom and grandma in town over the weekend. My grandma had been asking to come visit Pocatello for some time now and I'm glad it finally worked out, especially since I don't plan on being here for much longer. Nic kicked all of our butts at Phase 10. I swear my mom and I were still stuck on that ridiculous run of 9 for five rounds straight. Who can get past that one anyway?! Oh yeah, Nic can. I'm pretty sure that man is fabulous at everything he does.

I discovered I could most definitely become ISU's next official tour guide as I rambled out everything I knew about the campus while escorting my grandma around. It was good for me to stop and take a good look at it. I usually am either in such a hurry that I don't even notice half of the time or I really could care less because I have the worst case of senioritis and am counting down the days when I am rid of ISU. Either way, I recognized how much this place has truly made me grow and I'm grateful for that.

My favorite part of the weekend was shopping for Easter decorations which I'm pretty sure now consists of 99.7% nests with eggs in them leaving the measly .3% to that cute little baby chick we found a couple weeks ago. Thanks to my mom and grandma for coming all this way and for a fun weekend. We loved seeing you and miss you already!

a little weekend trip we liked to call Boise and back, Williamson edition

My stud of a brother who is currently going to school at the Naval Academy and lives clear across and I mean CLEAR ACROSS the country in Annapolis, Maryland came home for spring break. Funny thing, apparently little old Idaho doesn't communicate with the big East Coast states as our spring breaks were two weeks apart. Lame. So needless to say, I busted my buns last week getting as much homework done as possible to be able to go and see him.

While it wasn't the most opportune time to leave town, Nic and I had a blast! We both had to work until two on Friday so we didn't leave town until the afternoon. We played 20 questions almost the entire car ride. Man does that game seriously make you think! haha and of course the question-asker always tried to make it so much harder to figure it out than it ever needed to be. I'm pretty sure at one point Nic had me thinking I was trying to come up with some animal that did not have two legs or four or six or eight. HUH? who knows.

Friday night we had lobster ravioli, DELISH and played THE best game ever invented, Taboo! The "Wests" dominated (me, mom, and brother) against the rest of the bunch. Clearly we know each other well with all the fill in the blank clues we were dishing out while everyone else looked at as like we were completely crazy.

Saturday we did some shopping and went to Olive Garden for a late lunch. That darling little pink polka dot swimsuit and sun hat up there, we got that for my little baby niece Ava for her first birthday. I guess I can't really consider her a baby anymore. She cruises around the room at mock five which leads to the frequent collapses on the hard wood floor and the two bruises who have taken a permanent residence on her little forehead. Basically she melts my heart in every way possible. Abby had a hard time understanding that this was her sister's party and her sister's cake and her sister's presents. Well Abster, speaking as the older sibling when I was little too, I get the jealousy thing. You are still my favorite little girl and I would celebrate you every day if I could! Homemade tacos, fun family, one year old cake smashing (she ate EVERY.SINGLE.BITE), and Ava more interested in chewing on the boxes than the presents themselves made for one heck of a party! We ended the night watching my favorite movie, Just Go With It.

My brother's flight on Sunday was at six a.m. so we made sure to give him a huge hug the night before. Hopefully we will get the chance to see him sometime this summer but if not, I'm so glad we went to Boise last weekend to see him! We left around 9 a.m. to head back to the mountain of homework eagerly waiting for us.

It was a GREAT weekend and it just keeps coming. Looking forward to another fabulous weekend starting tomorrow with my mom and grandma coming to see us! I love my life :)

The Month of March

via

hello daylight savings time with an extra hour of light in the evenings. 

hello beautiful sunshine with the occasional glimpse of SPRING.

hello family we get to see when we go to Boise this weekend!!

hello baby niece who is turning ONE this month, (can hardly believe it).

hello ugly paint-chipped toes that need some pampering before I break out the flip flops.

hello 7 weeks left of the hardest semester of my life!

hello handsome husband with his new clinic coordinator badge!

hello much need SPRING BREAK in two weeks.

HELLO MARCH!

now lets make it a good one.

Spring

Don't let that leafless tree fool you because that beautiful blue sky and 60 degree weather is telling me that Spring is right around the corner. I can feel it! Nightly walks have become our new favorite thing to soak up those last few rays before descending over the foothills. We also played frisbee golf with our best friends Beau and Mindy today which I'm sure will become a frequent spring and summer outing. I'm a firm believer that the dark days of winter cause a Vitamin D deficiency and have a depressing way of taking a toll on a person. At least it does for me so bring on Spring! Now lets hope I don't jinx this and find snow outside my window Monday morning. :) Hope you all are having as sunny of a weekend as we are!

sometimes my husband says funny things

Last night after dinner, we both realized we were still hungry. One turned to the other and a conversation followed that went something like this... N - "Do you want a sweetie?" M - 20 seconds to figure out what he means... does he mean a sweet tart? No, we don't have any of those. A sweetheart? I doubt it, I'm pretty sure those went off the shelf the day after Valentine's Day. Thinking, thinking, thinking... Ohhhhh. "You mean a cutie?!" N - "YEAH, CUTIES!" 

HAHA, I had a pretty good laugh.  

The Vow

I vow to help you love life,

to always hold you with tenderness

and to have the patience that love demands,

to speak when words are needed

and to share the silence when they are not

and to live within the warmth of your heart and always call it home.

I vow to love you,

and no matter what challenges might carry us apart,

we will always find a way back to each other.

I promise to never forget this is a once in a lifetime love.

I had been dying to see this movie ever since I saw the trailer for the first time. When it came out around Valentine's Day we decided not go yet and wait the three or four months until it played in the "cheap" theatre, that was until yesterday afternoon anyway. We spent most of Saturday studying for school. Around four we both thought a movie sounded really good but after looking at what was playing at our cheap theatre, it didn't sound so good after all. Then Nic remembered over Thanksgiving break - we went to see Breaking Dawn with our moms and happened to go around four in the afternoon when they were having an unexpected promotion. Turns out it shouldn't have been so unexpected since the promotion is an every day deal - between 4:00 - 5:30 tickets are only $5 per person. Randomly remembering this we figured out it would only be four more dollars to go to the  nice, quiet, fancy theatre to see a matinee movie. Twenty minutes later we found ourselves rocking in those amazing plush chairs a few rows from the top.  

I've heard so many mixed reviews about this movie,since it came out that I began to feel disappointed even before seeing it myself. Most people's biggest complaint being that McAdams didn't have as much chemistry with Tatum as she did with Gosling. This had me a little worried because naturally I consider The Notebook to be the greatest love story of all time but seriously, who would NOT have chemistry with Channing Tatum.

Don't tell my husband I said that ;) HA

   

Well I'm here to tell you that this complaint was far from the case for me. After the credits began to roll across the screen all I wanted to do was sit there until it started again! I had never seen love portrayed in a more realistic light than I did during this movie. Their love for each other was real, their lifestyles very realistic, and even more than that, there wasn't any magic element that made every problem suddenly all better. In the movie, a young couple gets in a car accident and the wife wakes up not remembering who her husband is. She lost all of the memories they ever shared together. The realistic part about it was that after a car accident, memory doesn't just come back in a few days. In fact, sometime it never comes back and it didn't for her either. But it didn't matter because the trials that she went through didn't change who she truly was. She was still the same girl, with the same heart, that had the same passions in life. Her husband, while she couldn't remember him, wasn't just a part of her memory but was a part of who she was. I balled through the whole thing. To me it portrayed the most beautiful part of love. That no matter what happens, it will be the joy you find within yourself that will lead you back together, for that joy that makes you who you are, is the very same reason you fell in love the first time, and it can be the very same reason you fall in love all over again.