Changes.

Alright folks. This could be a larger one. I am finally able to update you on the "big decision" I referenced a while ago. The decision I was referring to was the decision of whether to leave my current wonderful job at the front desk of the H hotel to head to a potentially uncertain (but worth it) job of being the Assistant Director for Spring Hill Day Camps: Detroit. And the decision has been made. Stephen and I are taking a leap of faith (literally) and moving to Detroit this summer so I can give this job a shot. There is no garuntee that I will have a job come August and we don't know where we will live come August and we don't know what Stephen will do at any point after we move... so there are a few uncertainties to say the least.

But here is the good stuff: pay increase, working for the Hill (need I say more?), living closer to my family, we should have the option to get a dog this way, Stephen will have more opportunities to get into a fire department full time, and best of all, we will simply get away from the potentially dead end jobs we are at currently (particuarly the stinkin Home Depot).

So here is our plan. Sometime in the middle of May I will be heading to Spring Hill to train for about a month. Stephen will have quit his job by then and will just be finishing up school and hopefully coming to see me ALL THE TIME. Week one of camp is going to Traverse  City and I believe Stephen will join just to have a little vaca. The next week, we are in Indiana and Stephen (with the help of the in-laws) will use this week to move us down to the Detroit area (Thank you baby and fam). I will happily do all of the packing in exchange for Stephen doing the moving. The rest of the summer should be spent together down in the Detroit area living in the Grandparents house. Here come the contingancies....

Situation number 1: I get offered a job at the end of the summer working full time for Spring Hill and we get to stay in the area and Stephen gets an EMT or firefighter job and we live happily ever after.
Situation number 2: I do not get offered a job and we may or may not just move right to Florida.

There are a few things within those situations that could alter them in some way or another (and Linds, don't worry. If we move, we will wait til after September 16:-) but I guess we are just kind of waiting til God shows us where the next turn in the path is. Stephen has been so wonderful in giving up his fire job and being willing to take the risk and support me the whole way. He knows that my hours during the summer are going to be crazy but we both believe it is going to pay off in the end, even if it pays only in experience.

So that is the big one that is looming in the distance, but our other recent change is the fact that we have aquired some babies. And by babies, I mean ducklings! Dory and Cody-maverick are the newest additions to our little lives here in Bay City. THEY ARE AMAZING. Dory is just a cute little blond-y that is not the best at walking and she is super skinny (which I am a little concerned about). Cody-maverick is totally a little 10 year old boy. He likes to jump off of high places and tumble around. Him and Dory (as of today) like to race each other for a few feet which is maybe the cutest thing I have ever seen. They literally will follow us everywhere. If I am standing at the kitchen sink, Dory will sit right on my toes until I move. If we head in the other room really quick, they will do their best to follow us, though we are usually already back by the time they are half-way there. They swim, but it is a little rough and they don't like to do it for too long. There favorite place to sit and fall asleep is right up on on our shoulders or right on my chest. When they fall asleep, it is amazing how fast it happens. They will just sit down and as soon as they stop chirping their little heads will just fall to the side. SO PRECIOUS!

So anyway, we are loving are little children and having a lot of fun! Packing will probably start soon if I know myself. We will let you know if/when things are happening! Lots of love to anyone reading this!

March?! Really?!

Sot I know we talk about it all the time but time really and truly flies. Or rather, it IS currently flying. I just cannot believe for one second that it is already March. I have been married for 8 months. I have been out of school for almost a year. I have been out of highschool for 5 years! I am feeling old I guess; or grown up at least.... I gues it could be because I have been being "super wifey" lately as Stephen has been calling me or because we have finally made it to a point in our marriage where we are not as nervous about totally failing anymore. We know we can do this. We can hold jobs. We can make large decisions. We can hold each other up. We don't really fight. We keep our apartment clean. We get our laundry done (most of the time) in a timely manner. I guess I am just feeling like a grown up.

A week ago or so I was getting down(thanks a lot PMS) because I was thinking about how easy college was and how much easier high school was in comparison. It is not as if life is this great challange currently, but it is all on our shoulders. In college, I still leaned on my parents for a ton of stuff, even if I didn't realize it at the time. They paid for school. They paid for phone. They would help fix my car. Now those things are on us. We are doing fine! I just am getting used to the idea that this is ALWAYS how it is going to be and that blows my mind just a little bit.

I was talking to my wonderfully beautiful and intelligent friend Lindsey and we were talking about how wierd it is when the BIG milestones come, we are somehow always ready for them. For example, when we were in high school, college seemed like this far off land that was crazy. We would have to get ourselves to class ontime and buy our own food. And eventually move off campus and pay bills. And it all just seems to come at exactly the right time. Right when you are ready for it. HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN?! We graduated and it seemed like, literally, no big deal. Honestly, I was passe about graduating. It was the most chill thing in the world. Marriage was a pretty big one that I was pretty excited/nervous about but still, it just worked. I couldn't imagine living with a boy and I didn't know how that would work but it has and it is AWESOME.

I guess this blog post has no point but to say. Hi, my name is Laura and I am a grown up.

Babies.

Here's my babes.... Miles and Ramona are my favorite tiny humans in the whole world. Please enjoy.

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication"

Some would say Stephen and I are living simply. And that may be true but we are appreciating every simple pleasure that comes our way. Our apartment, our friends, our jobs (well, me more than Stephen there), seeing family, pretty snow, etc. So this post is a jumble of a few simple joyous things from the last month...

 I wanted to make sure I had some real photos of our apartment (It's our first place! Give me a break!) So here is our beautifully simple apartment AND as an added bonus... you can see some of the Christmas decorations (cough cough mom...). Enjoy!

Then this one time, I got to have a skype date with this love.... who I get to see again this coming Wed!

It was maaarvelous. Oh and then one day I came home and Stephen had bought me roses... and made dinner... it was magical. Have I ever mentioned that I love my husband very much?

Then came the blizzard, which was not so simple, but you get the idea! It would have been pretty terrible if either of us had needed to go to work.. and technically I probably did... but I don't think I could have gotten there... SO WE STAYED HOME! And with the exception of going outside for about 5 minutes, we did nothing. It was freaking amazing.

Yeah, we have no shovel... and the broom didn't do much... but it sure was pretty! And last but not least was our precious little superbowl date. We don't get Fox and therefore couldn't actually watch, but I wanted Stephen to have a little boy fun so we enjoyed some pigs-in-a-banket, beer, gummies, nachos, etc. It was amazing and we had fun with it!

So there is a little life update! Loving our life. Oh ps. we did make those decisions I talked about in my last post! Hooray! So off to Grand Rapids next and then who knows?!

The adventure is getting more adventerous...

Well folks. Stephen and I have made it a whopping six months and have been pretty much stoked about every minute of it. We have created a really cute apartment. Managed to secure really stable full time jobs. Stephen is on a Fire Department. I have auditioned at Disney. We have managed to keep our friends as friends despite living hundreds of miles from a lot of them. And we have enjoyed getting to know each other in this whole new way! God seems to be deciding that it is time to shake things up a bit for us.

There have been a few things coming our way lately that suggest we might be changing things up soon. OR things might stay exactly the same as they are now, WHO KNOWS? I can't write in detail yet about what has come my way because it has not been decided. I can tell you that if it comes to fruition, we will be moving. Ultimately, we don't even know where we may end up in the end, but we would be leaving our cute little apartment. So for now, I will leave it at that and update here soon.

For Stephen, he just found out that there is another Grand Rapids Fire Department recruiting test. For those of you who don't know the story, Stephen took this test last year sometime. At the time, the dept was hiring 12 new recruits. About 1500 people showed up for the test (it's a two day thing). Stephen made the first cut, which narrowed the field to 150 people I believe (maybe 200... not sure). The second test narrows the field to 30. Stephen's score made him number 31. Yeah. He was close. The next part of the exam would have been the physical, which I know he would do great at. So yeah, this has come around again and there is this whole new possibility in front of us. I am not sure how we would work this with my new opportunity, but we are pretty awesome at working things out.

So our lives are in complete upheaval right now. Both working hard still, lots of conversation, lots of love, and still a lot of fun. We are learning a lot about making these huge-ola decisions together and it is definitely nice to know that we are very good at communicating how we feel about all this. It's sweet! So we will let you know what is going on when WE figure out what is going on!

For now, life is good. And Happy Six Months of Awesome to my mega hot husband.

Jon and Kait. An Engagement Preview.

Jon and Kait are good friends of Stephen and mine and I am shooting their wedding this summer! They are so much fun to hang out with and they were so natural in front of the camera! Granted, Kait admittedly loves to have her picture taken, so this was pretty much just another day living the fabulous life! This was my first engagement session and it was absolutely wonderful! I hope I have the opportunity to do it again. Jon and Kait, hope you love em!

Festivus for the rest of us.

Let's start with Baking and Bonding! As per tradition, Stephen and I, and Liz and Jay, Brad and Ash, all the parents and Jord met up at the Ronketto's to commence with some SERIOUS baking. The gingerbread house building contest commenced. There were obstacles as the gingerbread houses were about 3 inches tall and 3 inches wide. If you would like to vote for the winner, feel free to visit Ashley's facebook page. Just keep in mind that Jordan cheated, Liz and Jay's hose was not even whole, Brad didn't actually do anything, Ashley commandeered both her and Brad's houses, and Stephen pulled the God card.... Just food for thought.  The rest of the night consisted of lots of sugar, dirty jokes, cigars, beer, and being verrry sleepy. It was a wonderful kick off to the Christmas festivities!

  

Then, Christmas Eve was a Stephen and me celebration! We spent the day relaxing, finishing up Christmas wrapping and such, and then we feasted! Grandpa got us a package of Omaha Steak products, so we partook in the Filet Mignon, twice baked potatoes, and some awesome Broccoli. It was an awesome date and a wonderful meal! Best first Christmas Ever together.

Then Christmas day came along and I had to work..............It got better though. After work, we headed over to Stephen's parents and had a real Christmas day! We feasted, we wii'd, we feasted some more, and we had a lot of fun. It was an awesome Christmas day! 

We stayed the night at the Eich's, went to church in the morning, and laid around watching some serious football then next day. Ahhh... life. The week was work. That's pretty much it. Then came NEW YEARS-MAS! I worked on New Years Eve, and then we headed down to my parents house. Had Thanksgiving dinner (don't ask), then off to the Millers for New Years Eve festivities! We played this game, that's not really Beer Pong, but it pretty much is, except there is not a table, it's more that you use your body.... and as that sounds inappropriate, I am just gonna put some pictures up. 

So, we got home late, slept for a long time, and then it was officially, Christmas (the second). We had an awesome breakfast of Mimosa's and Cinnamon rolls. Matt and Megs surprised us all and Christmas could really begin! It was so fun having Miles and Ramona there; Miles, because he is really funny and thinks every present is his, and Ramona because she is just precious. The day was spent eating, opening presents, and once again, watching football. (I have found that football has become an integral part of my life since marrying Stephen and it is actually really fun when you know what is going on.)

 

So, the Christmas of Oh-ten is officially over and Oh-eleven(?) has begun. It was a pretty great year last year, so we will have to see what is going to make this year even better.  Love to all and to all a good year.