Youtube Vortex...

It happens...you know it happens. You start with one video, which leads to another and another and before you know it, you've been sucked into the Youtube vortex. You've spent an entire evening skipping around watching who knows what!

It didn't start out here, but every so often, I need to get my Les Miserables fix. I know, I know ...really?? Les Miserables?? Yes, really. Les Miserables.

These boys were a surprise...it gets really good towards the end.

And really...you just can't go wrong with this. The finale gets me every.single.time.

P.S...I think I would die of excitement and happiness if I ever had the opportunity to be in the "back-up" chorus at a concert like this. Holy crap...that would be the most amazing thing ever!

Redundant question...

It's the end of July. It will be August first in a few short days. Where in the world did my summer go??? I really do know the answer to that question, but I still feel there is merit in asking the question. I'm suddenly facing down the new school year, a new job, new curriculum, new office politics and I'm just now getting in some solid lazy, TV time.

It's not like it hasn't been a productive summer...I mean, my best friend married the love of her life, I experienced a cool new city and discovered the amazingness of Powell's City of Books. I discovered the cool, awe inspiring Cannon Beach, fell in love, got engaged, pursued moving to a different time zone, started planning a wedding, did a sister vacation to Cedar City, spent time catching up with friends, worked to maintain a long distance relationship (turns out this one is really difficult), helping out family...it's no wonder my head is spinning a bit, right?

There has also been a significant health issue hanging over my head. The week I left for Portland my doctor told me there was a possibility that I may have Uterine Cancer. Yikes, right? I've had a biopsy (which was quite possibly the most painful medical procedure I have ever experienced - and that's saying something!!) and we're waiting on results. I'm choosing to believe I am fine. If it was actually cancer I think my doctor would be treating this whole process with a bit more urgency. Besides, for the most part, I feel fine. However, for the past month or so this has been a driving force behind quite a few decisions Vlad and I have made. To that end, we've decided that we are going to focus on getting him relocated to Utah before setting a date. We want time to just be together as a couple before jumping headlong into marriage.

I have about two weeks before I have to go back to school. Students return on the 19th of August and I need to be back on the 14th. I'm starting to get a little nervous about starting at a new school. I left behind a pretty solid, amazing faculty and group of friends. I know I can do this and I will do it well. It's just that first big step into the unknown that always makes me a tad anxious.

My summers have typically been very lazy and seem to go on forever. By the time August rolls around I'm usually very ready to head back to school. This year I just feel like my summer is starting and it'll be over in a few short weeks. So even though I know the answer the question, I ask....where in the world did my summer go????

Why??

Why is it you say "wedding" and suddenly people want to cover you in rhinestones and pearls, charge you $250 for something you could make for $50 and expect you to have the next 30 years of your life planned out in great detail?


Also...how did people plan weddings without the aid of Pinterest and the interwebs??

That's all...

Midnight rumble...

Last night my neighbors had a party of sorts...I think. They've been moving stuff out quite a bit and I think (hope) they're moving, but can't quite be sure. Last night at around 2:00 in the morning I heard the following exchange...

"That &*#*ing *%&$*# thinks she can *($%)$* with my sister!"

followed by some indistinguishable conversation...

From what I could understand, someone was messing with this girl's sister, so she decided to go do something about it. The mother came out and, instead of telling this girl to chill, reminds her daughter to bring the eggs and to call and let her know that they got away safely and didn't get caught...


...SO.MANY.THINGS.WRONG....


In other news, I put a deposit down on a wedding dress yesterday! That statement seems a little odd...I mean, I put a deposit down for a dress. People usually put deposits down for houses, cars, apartments, vacations...but a dress?? I'm not going to post a picture because I want Vlad to be surprised...at least I do right now. As many know, I'm not the most patient of individuals, so I may eventually show him a picture.

Change of Address...

In the past week I have put over 1,000 miles on my car. Granted, a good chunk of that was from driving from Washington to Utah...but seriously, I have spent far too much time in my car of late. I feel like I should put in a change of address with the Post Office and use my license plate number.

On Friday Vlad and I left his place and drove an hour and a half to drop his truck off at the airport. We left his place around 4:30pm. After we dropped his truck off, put oil in my car and grabbed a sub par dinner, it was about 6:30. This is when our odyssey began in earnest. The drive to Idaho Falls really should have only take us about 8 hours...putting us in Idaho Falls around 2:30. We're not entirely sure how or why but this trip stretched into almost 12 hours. We ended up pulling over at a rest stop to sleep for an hour before continuing on our trek. We got to Vlad's Grandma's house around 6:00 Saturday morning. Now, the smart thing to do would be to grab some zzzzzz's. Instead we went to breakfast with some friends, got back in the car and drove to Utah. We took turns sleeping and driving. Once we reached my place, we changed real quick and then got back in the car and drove to Salt Lake to have dinner at my parents.

This trip was intended for Vlad to meet my family, but we were both so tired that I'm not sure my parents really got a good idea of who Vlad is and who we are as a couple. Oh well.... At this point we are running on somewhere in the neighborhood of 4 hours of sleep. Do we head back to my place after dinner? NOPE!! We get back in the car and head down to Lehi to spend some time with Vlad's best friend and best man. After some freak car trouble, we don't get back to my apartment until after midnight.

Sunday morning we were up and at a friend's for breakfast by 9am. We were both so tired. We managed a nap for a couple of hours on Sunday afternoon, but we were both pretty much still dead on our feet. 

This week I've also been helping Annie with the kiddos as she recovers from an unexpected surgery. That means getting up early to take the kids to swim and ballet camp. I'm happy to help out, but me being slightly sleep deprived has meant young children are a test to my patience. On Monday Annie told me I need to take a nap...so true! I came home and passed out for two hours. I probably would have slept longer if Vlad hadn't called and woke me up.

It's been a very busy summer with lots of changes. On our expedition from Washington Vlad and I made some very important decisions. The biggest was probably that he'll be moving to Utah and not the other way around. It wasn't an easy decision but we both think this will be the best choice for us long term. All the stress and anxiety from last week was pretty much erased with that decision. There are still some unknowns but we're getting there...slowly.

I am so excited to marry this man. 

After surviving the ridiculous trek from Washington, ice cream was in order....

Today's adventure...

Today I drove myself out to Elk Creek Idaho to see the Elk Creek Falls. Vlad and I were going to do it yesterday but opted for another date night activity. However, in the discussion last night he told me it was a hike but the trail was paved. No problem...

uuummm....yeah. Trail was not paved...at all....as in no pavement for miles around. The road to get to the trail head was a dirt road. I thought I was driving into the middle of some logging company's property and kept praying that when I came around the next corner I'd see a parking lot of some sort for this trail. Fortunately, eventually the road did just that.

It ended up being a 2.5 mile hike on a fairly easy trail. However, I was not prepared for forest floors, pine needles and tree roots. I was wearing flip flops. Now, to be fair to myself, I didn't really bring hiking appropriate footwear with me to Washington. My calves are definitely feeling it now.

The end result - the Upper Elk Creek Falls were somewhat lack-luster, but the surrounding nature more than made up for the underwhelming waterfall. 

It was nice to get out of the apartment and, at least attempt, to get my mind off of all the stuff that is swirling around.

Mea culpa

I am totally and completely failing at the whole don't be a sappy over-sharer on social media. Sorry guys...total fail. Mea culpa.

After the melt down of yesterday I had a nice chat with Lisa and we both are very happy that we're going through this wedding/newlywed thing sort of together. Vlad asked me last week if I thought I'd be getting married so close to Lisa and I honestly didn't, but I'm very glad that I am!!

Vlad came home from work today after having a rough day and I was definitely in need of some cheering, so we went on a date. It wasn't anything fancy or anything but it was so nice to go out together and just spend time together. We went to dinner at Qdoba...side note - why has this delicious Mexican Grill not found its way to Utah?? It seems like it would be a no-brainer. Anyway, after dinner we went to check out the various family plans on our respective cell phone carriers, because hellooooo, we're going to be a family! How's that for a reality check??

We then worked on our registry...yeah...that was fun. I had some guilt over some of the larger items... Kitchenaid Mixer and things like that. Vlad and I were walking through and looking at the various items and talking about what we would actually use and it hit me...I'm getting married. Like...seriously. I'm getting married. I have friends offering to throw be bridal showers. People are going to buy me stuff...lots of stuff. Vlad and I are going to be husband and wife...eep!! As this reality check was happening, I turned to look at him and thought to myself...that's right. You're marrying that goober... but he's your goober.

After some serious retail therapy/window shopping, we went and got ice cream.

His "why you take my picture...I eat ice cream" face

His "yeeeeah...she's going to take another picture" face

His...yeah...he's just a goofball

I'm thinking, "Yay! I didn't cut his face off!!"

Aaaand his phone had the better quality

First Melt down...check and check...

There are so many things going on in my life right now. The wonderful things are bigger than the not so great things...mainly, I get to marry my best friend (and no, I'm not talking about Lisa). However, there are few things that I can't control and are holding up some of my plans with Vlad. It's so incredibly frustrating because I just want to be with him and start our life together.

Other than hinting at it a little, I haven't said anything online and I'm going to be super vague while trying to explain what's going on. There are some health issues (me...I mean, of course it would be me, right? I'm the medical anomaly in my family, so why would that change now?) that will have a huge impact on the when, where and how of the wedding AND potentially the next six months of our lives AND the rest of our married life...potentially. The uber frustrating part is that I won't really know anything until the end of the month. That means that while we can sort of discuss options and potential outcomes in vague generalities, we really can't make any concrete decisions about anything.

And I mean anything.

We have a tentative wedding date, but that date may change...significantly...depending on the results of tests that can't be done until the end of the month. We can't set a venue with a date. And you can't really plan anything without a date.

We have no idea, really, where we will be living. Will I be moving and starting a new job? Will Vlad be moving and looking for a new job? WE.DON'T.KNOW! We don't really know anything other than we're getting married sometime in the next 3ish months.

Now, for a person that needs to know what's going to happen, when it's going to happen and where it's going to happen on even the most mundane of events, imagine the anxiety and stress I am feeling to not know a damn thing. I'm a teacher. We like to be in control. We are used to assessing the situation and taking swift and decisive action to address the issue at hand. I can't do that now. It's making me feel a little helpless...and I don't like feeling helpless. In fact, I loathe it. It makes me cranky.

I love Vlad. I love him more than I thought possible and I really am quite happy. I'm just wishing we could fast forward to the end of the month and really begin. This waiting game royally sucks. Lucky for me I have a sweet, supportive, funny and kind partner in life to wait with. Overall, I'm pretty lucky, don't you think?

Once upon a time...

...there was a girl who was frustrated with the dating game. She was tired of going on first dates. She was tired of paying for membership(s) to online dating sites. She was tired of getting involved with men that treated her poorly or were just brain dead. She was emotionally drained and tired of it all and she was ready to throw in the towel. But before she could do that, she decided to give it one last go.

With some reluctance and slight resentment, she charged the dating website membership to her account. She knew what would happen...or so she thought. She'd talk to some men...maybe go on a few first dates, maybe even a couple of second or even third dates. But, invariably it would fizzle or he would be odd, weird, scary or just plain boring. Or perhaps they'd both acknowledge that though they thought the other person was nice, it just wasn't going to work between them.

Her expectations firmly in place, she went forth and attempted to put herself "out there". She came across one profile that caught her eye. He liked to travel...he was self aware...he had a cute smile. He also lived in another state. "Meh...", she thought, "Not like it's going to go anywhere anyway...". And with the click of a mouse she sent off the first round of questions, not really expecting a response.

Imagine her surprise when he answered her questions and then, gasp(!), he kept responding. It wasn't easy for either of them...they'd both been hurt in the past and were somewhat skeptical that something could actually work out for them. They progressed through emails within the website to emailing through their personal emails. Phone numbers were exchanged and with some trepidation, they had their first phone conversation. Clocking in at approximately three hours, it set the pattern for long conversations about any and everything.

Phone calls stalled as he was in a show followed by finals and disappeared for a little while. She wasn't sure what to think but, with some encouragement from her fearless best friend, decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and was patient...ish.

Phone calls picked up again post-show and they started Skyping. Soon they were making plans to meet up when she was on vacation in Portland.

You can probably imagine how nervous and anxious she was to meet this boy. He could be completely psychotic or smell bad or be totally boring or worse yet...be a wonderful guy with zero chemistry. Yet, she needn't have worried. They fell in love in Portland. It wasn't slow but rather like lightening. She watched him as he walked the beach with her, explored the Rose Garden and the Japanese Garden and found herself picturing their life together. When he dropped her off at the airport, she wasn't sure how they would make it work only that she knew she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him.

What was originally going to be a two week separation turned into one week because neither could stand the thought of being apart for so long. She packed her bags and a week later showed up on his door. Luckily, he was expecting her...

The rest, I suppose you can say, happened as these things do. There was a ring and a question. I bet you can figure out her answer...

Something out of a fairy tale...isn't it?

Day 1

I have spent one full day in WA with Vlad. He was at work yesterday and I spent some time with his good friend, Kelli. I hope that one day I can call her my good friend too, and I think we're off to a good start! She showed me around the area and we went to lunch. Her two kids are adorable and funny. She clearly cares about Vlad and wants him to be happy, so that puts us on the same team!

Vlad and I made dinner last night and then just hung out all night. It's all very domestic and I love every second of it.