All In ONE Year!

Roland and I celebrated our one year anniversary not that long ago, which has caused me to think back over this year and what has all happened! Many wonderful new adventures have been started, conquered, and remembered all in just one year. I figured that I would share a few of our memories from our first year as a married couple!

The first adventure that we started was SCHOOL! I had done two years of college before while Roland was on his mission, but it was my first time atteneding school as a married woman. Roland on the other hand, hadn't gone to school since high school, and that was FOUR years ago! To say the least, he was a little nervous over the whole thing! Roland attended University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point as a full time student and worked part time at Target, while I attened Mid-State Technical College on the Stevens Point Campus . . . and I searched for a CNA job. I did in October find a CNA job at an assisted living, and enjoyed working there very much! As the semester started to come to a close, I desided that realisticly Roland and I couldn't affored for both of us to be going to school at the same time and since I wasn't really sure what I wanted to go to school for anymore, I desided that it would be better if I worked full time to help support Roland through school. Roland, of course, told me that it was my dicition and he would support me in what I choose, with the promise that he would support me going back to school when I decided to do that. Roland learned a couple new things from his frist semester . . . first: school first, work second, meaning that he would work after classes, not before; second: having long gaps between classes are only okay if you stay on campus, and in general should be advoided; third: college is harder than high school, you just might need to spend a little more time studying; fourth: don't skip class, once you skip the first one, it is easy to skip another one; and fifth: school is meant to be fun, it is okay to do non-academic activties as long as you get your school work done! Walking into his second semester with much more comfidence than the first and finding that when he put to practice the things that he had learned, he completed his first year successfully! One down . . . I don't want to think about how many more are to go! :)

Another adventure that we went through, was the fun filled search for a JOB! Living off of love does sound like fun, but after the money that we had saved up was started to disappear . . . having a job and earning money sounded like a good idea! So much for that money tree I planted in the backyard . . . I knew that had to be a catch to it, maybe I forgot to water it! :) I searched high and low . . . and suddenly, just when I was about to give up all hope, I got a job! Interestingly enough, my first day was on Roland's one year anniversary of working at Target! I had a job, and life was good! Amazing how the small and smiple things in life make everything else just a little bit sweeter!

One of the most fun adventures we had was figuring out THE HOLIDAYS WITH TWO FAMILIES! Thanksgiving Day, both Roland and I had to work . . . Roland in the morning and me in the evening! So, my family came to us to have a Thanksgiving lunch! Unfortunately, it was the week of Thanksgiving that our oven decided to stop working . . . so where does that leave us, without a turkey? My mom came to the rescue with her electric roaster oven . . . so, no fear, we did have a traditional Thanksgiving meal! That weekend, I happened to have off, so Roland and I were able to go up and spend the weekend with his family! We took a family picture, since the next time that all of the kids were going to be together again would be another two years, since Roland's brother, Sam, is now serving a two year mission for our church in California as a missionary! It is always fun having family time!
Christmas was another fun adventure . . . this year I worked Christmas Eve, so Christmas Eve morning we spent at my parents' home, opening presents and eating yummy food and enjoying the time with my family and my grandparents! Christmas morning we went up to Roland's parents' home to celebrate with them. Sam, Roland's brother, was able to call home, so all of us were able to talk to him! We opened presents, ate yummy food, went sleding in the front yard (and froze our noses off), and just enjoyed the time that we could as a family. Roland's sister, Nicole, and her husband moved to Rexburg, Idaho to go to school shortly after Christmas, so it was nice to be able to see them one more time. Interestingly enough, Roland's dad was given a great oppertunity to be able to go back to school to get his Masters in Pediatric Dentrictry, and they would be moving to Seattle, Washington in June, so this really was the last family get together for awhile.  

In our pageant clothes . . . now does Roland look the part?

I believe that I should count OUR TRAVELS as our next adventure, or adventures! I have already blogged about our Spring Break Chicago trip, so I wont bore you with repeating those stories, but I will talk about how we went down to Nauvoo for two weeks in July! Yep, two weeks in my favorite place in the whole wide world, how much better could it get than that? We had the great oppertunity to be ablte to go down and particapate in the Nauvoo Pageant this year as part of the family cast! I am not going to tell you all about it in this post, because this adventure deserves a posting all to itself, but I will tell a little bit about it, right now, as a preview! Roland and I had the "brilliant" idea of camping in a tent while we were down there for the two weeks. On paper, it does sound good . . . but remember, that is ONLY on paper! The first week the weather was BEAUTIFUL and we had really no problems . . . it was the second week that it got a little more interesting! The heat index was about 120 degress outside! A family took us in to their home for the second week so we could be in air conditioning! We made so many wonderful new friends and had so much fun! We acted, we danced, we sang, we sweat like crazy . . . we had the time of our lives! :)

Roland was so proud of the fave that he did my hair! :)

   Well, that is pretty much our lives this past year . . . full of fun filled adventures! I am looking forward to what this next year has in store for us!