Happy Valentines Day!

So I know it's a couple days before, but I got my Valentines early this year. :)

Garrett had to go out of town for work. He left yesterday and will be gone until Thursday morning. Since he isn't going to be here Tuesday, he surprised me with an early Valentine. :)

I had to work yesterday until three, and Garrett had to be on the road around 2. So around 1:30 he came by my work to leave me a sweet Valentines Day card and say goodbye. (I love when he visits me at work.) The card was really sweet and it was fun talking to him. We said our forever long goodbye and he was on the road. When I got out of work I locked up the building and headed out to my car. When I opened the door, I found a beautiful pink rose on the drivers seat with a little hand written card that said, "I love our long drives together." :) Well, I melted inside and called him up to tell him how thoughtful he was, to thank him for the beautiful rose, and agree with him about our long drives together. :) I smelled the flower as I talked to him on the way home feeling like a princess. Little did I know that was only flower #1.

I walked through the door and immediately saw flower #2 on the table in the entryway with another hand written card stating another thing he loved about me. :) I once again thought that was so sweet and figured he'd just quickly dropped it off on his way back from seeing me before he hit the long road. My mom and brothers and sisters were all sitting in the piano room and so I went in to chat with them and to smell my beautiful flowers and swoon over what a lucky girl I am to have such a thoughtful and wonderful prince charming. :)

As we sat there I began to notice that my family was acting a little strange... I looked around at them trying to figure out what was going on. I felt like I was the odd one out on some kind of inside joke. My mom went over to the piano and started playing "Heart and Soul" and that's when it all clicked. :) There was flower #3 sitting on the piano keys with another "I love you" note. As I looked at and smelled my beautiful flower my mom made the suggestion that I go and get a vase........... a big one. :)  The search was on!

On my way to the Kitchen I found flowers 4 & 5, and in and around the kitchen area were flowers 6-8. I carefully put those flowers in a vase and headed up to my room. When I opened the door I found 4 more flowers making a total of 12. Each flower was accompanied by a sweet note stating something that he loves about me. :)

Each flower is so unique and beautiful! I swear he went into the flower shop and searched until he found the most beautiful, most perfect flowers that they had! I love him so much! And I feel like the luckiest valentine in the world!

Engagements at Snow Basin

Okay, so these are just a few of the pictures that we took for our engagement shots. (Isn't he so cute?!) I wanted to put so many more but I can't figure out yet how to post a slide show of pictures so I'll have to be satisfied with just these ones for now. :)

Getting our engagement pictures was a fun experience. We have a GREAT photographer! He's so fun and he does a really good job. (http://jeffhodgesphoto.blogspot.com/)

We decided to take our pictures up at Snow Basin because I really wanted snow in the pictures. (You would think that in January it wouldn't be too difficult to find a spot with a lot of snow but hey, this is Utah. You never know what the weather will do.) And it was fun. :) Jeff was really familiar with the area because he's done photo shoots there before, so he knew where all of the perfect spots were for picture taking. The first spot we went to was a small path lined with tall trees and covered in snow. He had us walk down the path a ways ahead of him, and then turn and start walking toward him while he snapped a few shots. Garrett and I just started giggling. :) It felt so unreal! We couldn't believe that we were actually getting our own engagement pictures taken! It was so much fun.

We got up to Snow Basin and it was COLD! We should have known that it would be. After all, we were on a ski resort... :) It's kind of funny looking through the pictures. You can watch our noses and cheeks gradually grow darker and darker as we were growing colder and colder... :) But it was totally worth every shiver and every chatter of our teeth. :) We had decided that we wanted to start with some formal pictures and end with some that were a little more casual. Beginning in a skirt and heels might not have been the best idea. BRRRRR! :) But Garrett was so sweet and didn't make me walk through the snow. He carried me everywhere so that my feet wouldn't get too cold. :) Do you see why I'm crazy about him?!

At the end of the photo shoot Jeff suggested snow angels and a snowball fight. I reached down for some snow to make my first snowball and immediately dropped it! It was FREEZING!!! You know that cold that is so cold that it burns? That's what this snow was like. There was no way I could hold onto it long enough to form it into a ball. My Prince Charming came to the rescue again. :) He made all four snowballs so that I wouldn't have to freeze my hands. Aw! :) After the snowball fight we decided to fore go the snow angels and head home to thaw out our frozen bones. :) But we had a really good time.

Planning

I have no idea how to start a family blog. I didn't really think I ever would. But my mom has one, my friends have them, and it seems like everyone else has them too. So I decided, why not follow the trend and start my own family blog? :) So here I am making my first entry. I'm not the best writer so I hope this doesn't completely bore anyone reading it to death. It's mostly for my family to keep them posted about what's going on with Garrett and me while we're away for the summer and maybe for school. (We don't know where we'll be yet. He's still applying to law school. Cross your fingers!) I'm sure we'll end up wherever we are supposed to be. I just can't wait to find out where "supposed to be" happens to be. :)

I am writing this and the clock on my blog says that we are exactly 25 days 15 hours 35 minutes and  40 seconds away from being sealed for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake City, Utah Temple. (On March 7, 2012 at 10:20am precisely. :) Yay!) Looking at that clock makes me sooo excited, but it also makes me a little nervous because I can see how much needs to be done in so little time. I never knew how much went into planning a wedding: Pictures, invitations, more pictures, bridal showers, cake decorators, flowers, packing up your things, reception planners, planning, planning, and more planning! But even though it's a lot to sort through, it's fun.