because I'm OBSESSED with 914

One thing everyone should know about me right off the bat is that I'm pretty much obsessed with my birthday. Honestly, I don't even know what it is. It could be that "September fourteenth" just rolls so nicely off my tongue. It could be that September is the beginning of fall, which is my favorite season. It could be that my birthday means Halloween is just around the corner, followed closely by Thanksgiving and Christmas. Or it could be a plethora of other random things.
I seem to always look at the clock right at 9:14, sometimes both times each day. I always notice license plates with 914 in sequential order. I notice expiration dates (sadly I'll probably be seeing less and less of those with 2014 creeping up). I can see a random sequence of numbers and low and behold 914 is there. From nail polish numbers to grocery bills, 914 is always popping up. I'm sure you're thinking to yourself, "You're around other numbers just as frequently, but you're so obsessed with 914 that you automatically and subconsciously pick it out of a crowd." Sure, that sounds totally reasonable. But you must not realize how often I come across this number. It's seriously uncanny, and I seriously couldn't love it more. Friends and family have even texted me things like "Happy birthday o'clock" at 9:14 or pictures of random numbers that include 914.
I mean, seriously.

 I'm so obsessed that even when I see a random sequence that doesn't sequentially contain 9-1-4, I rearrange the numbers in my head to make them say 914. Or if I see 9:41 I just think to myself, "Oh, if I switched the 1 and the 4 it would say 914." Maybe I need some intervention.
I can always tell after Brad gets my birthday present. Even if my birthday is a week away he'll always start asking if I want to celebrate that day. He gets so excited for the craziness that will surely ensue on September 14th that he seems to hardly be able to wait. I always sternly say no, because I want to celebrate ON MY BIRTHDAY and not one minute before.
As soon as the alarm clock went off last Friday, Brad was up and at em singing "Happy Birthday" and throwing Killer on top of me so she'd give me lots of birthday kisses. I had school off that day (lucky!), but unfortunately Brad had to go to class. Before he left I got to open my present.

A new backpack! I had been saying I wanted a new one for a while. My previous backpack was a hand-me-down from a friend in high school. Needless to say, it was getting a little warn out. It treated me well throughout college and always kept everything inside nice and dry while I walked home during snow storms, but, alas, it was time to retire old faithful. I didn't realized how badly I needed a new one until I started school again. At one point my old pack had nice padded shoulder straps that could withstand the weight of anything I put inside, but over the years the straps had wilted away to mere sheaths of fabric. Look at the padding on this baby, ya'll! Serious business.

My old pack also didn't have enough space. It was old school with only one compartment and no mesh side pockets for drinks. Not only can I fit my normal water bottle in the side, but on days that I'm especially thirsty I can now take my 32 oz honker of a Nalgene.

 Can you tell that I LOVE this thing!
After Brad got home from school, we went to my all-time favorite place - Mellow Mushroom - for dinner. Coincidentally all their appetizers were half off that night (they must have known I was coming), so we got 2! We ate ourselves silly and still had some leftover (yum...cold pizza...my favorite!!!). We then came home and picked up the pup. Brad took us to a park near our house, where we laid blankets and pillows in the back of our truck and watched the first four episodes of the first season of Modern Family, which Sara and Steve gifted me with. When we got back home, we finally had room for some yummy ice cream cake. This thing was deliciously delectable and ginormous. We just finally finished it off yesterday. It was an awesome end to a perfect day!

  And just because no blog post is complete without a picture of my favorite pup, for your viewing pleasure, Killer:

Courtney

To My Father

At church on Father's Day Sunday, this guy gave a WONDERFUL talk about all the things he's learned from his dad. It was seriously one of the best talks I've heard in a while. He talked about how while his father was by no means perfect, he would not be the man he was today without the influence of his dad. Well, in honor of both Father's Day and my dad's birthday (poor guy, these two important days always get smashed into one celebratory day) I decided to also write a list about all the things I learned from my dad.

*One of my dad's favorite pastimes is fishing. Growing up I always loved hearing stories about all his wonderful fishing adventures. I imagined him to be the modern day Tom Sawyer walking around barefoot, fishing rod resting over his shoulder, tackle box in one hand, and dog in tow right beside him. Well it wasn't long after I started walking that I started fishing. We would go out on the dock, which I'm sure felt like way out into the ocean, and we would fish for whatever we could catch.

When we moved from the beach to the mountains I'd go digging in the dirt in search of the fattest earthworms I could find in preparation for a day of fishing. We'd park the truck somewhere and hike way back into the woods and fish in little streams that no one knew about. We'd drive into town and stop at fishing stores where I'd pick out the coolest bobbers I could find for myself and pretty pink sparkling lures for my dad to use.

I even remember the day I graduated from a cane pole to real rod. We were visiting one of my dad's friend's who lived right on a lake, and I was sitting with my dad and his friend not catching a darn thing with my cane pole. I begged and begged to please try my dad's rod. Finally he gave in and on the first cast I caught the biggest catfish I'd ever seen. I couldn't even reel it in by myself. We brought that fish home, froze it, and ate it a few weeks later. After that I got my own rod.

Once in the first grade my dad was going to go fishing all night at this lake full of fish. I don't how but he convinced my mom to let me go with him. He went a few hours early and got everything set up for us, and my mom brought me by later on. There were bug zappers everywhere, but he still covered me head to toe in bug spray. We fished all night and the next morning I remember watching the sun rise, which I had never really seen before.

When we moved to Tennessee we bought a house right on the lake, and I'm sure my dad had something to do with that. We would fish all day every day during the summer. Sometimes we'd catch fish so big I'd have to back up the bank to get it out of the water. We'd catch turtles and have races.

 As I got older and moved from middle school to high school and my friends started becoming more important, fishing became less and less of a priority. But I will never forget all the memories made sitting on lawn chairs waiting for a fish to bite. To this day I still swear that's how I learned patience. You can't make a fish bite, you just have to wait, and sometimes one never does swim off with your hook in its mouth. But I learned not to get disappointed but to just keep trying. Your patience and persistence will eventually pay off. I can still hook a fish with the best of em.

* Another important lesson I learned from my dad was how to change a tire. One Friday night in high school some friends and I were driving to the football game. We had to drive through an area that was just being built up and there was lots of construction going on. Well it just so happened that I had the unfortunate luck of running over a nail. I heard this awful popping noise and immediately knew what had happened. We pulled over into the Chick-fil-a parking lot, and I called my dad. I told him what happened and asked what I should do. He said, "Just go on to the game. I'm not worried a bit about you. You know how to change a tire if you need to." And that was that. We went onto the game. After he got off the phone my mom asked what he was talking about, so he told her what happened. Well she didn't like that one bit, and they brought me another car during the game. I always love telling this story because it shows my parents' personalities perfectly.

* My dad taught me how to laugh and be silly. Everything doesn't always have to be serious and go according to plan. Sometimes you just need to make a fool out of yourself. And sometimes you just need to laugh at yourself even if no one else is laughing. It's ok to think you're funny, because you probably are.

* My dad is incredibly proud of where he's from. There's this song called "I'm From the Country" by Tracy Byrd, and every time I hear it I think of my dad.

Way back up in the country, back in the hills
Down in the hollers where the folks are real
Livin’ with the crazzies and the old wildcats
Sawed off shotguns and coonskin caps
That’s where I’m from and I’m proud to say
I’m from the country and I like it that way

Everybody knows everybody, everybody calls you friend
You don’t need an invitation, kick off your shoes come on in
Yeah, we know how to work and we know how to play
We’re from the country and we like it that way

I am proud of growing up in Tennessee sometimes to a fault. It's been a huge hassle for me to get in-state tuition for graduate school. I've had to jump through hoops and fill out petitions - all because I didn't have a Georgia driver's license. Sure, it would have made life a lot easier and less stressful getting ready for school if I had just gone down to the DMV and gotten one. But there was NO WAY I was ever going to do that. I am way too proud of my Tennessee license to give it up. I've got in-state tuition now, so there's really no reason for getting a new license at this point. :)

* The way my dad learned to swim was by some cousins throwing him off a cliff into a river. Sink or swim. Every time I heard this story I was always appalled, because of the gentle and patient nature that my father taught me to swim. From the time I could sit up by myself I was in the water - splashing around at the beach. Then when we moved to Tennessee is when I really learned to swim. Our neighborhood had a pool right up the street from our house. Every day the first summer we lived there my dad took me to the pool, and he was determined I'd know how to swim by the end of the summer. He achieved his goal, and I grew up into a girl who seriously can't get enough of the water.

 * I learned to be a competitor from a young age. If you want anything in life you have to work for it and sometimes you have to beat other people out for it. You do your best and you work hard and you never quit. I learned to run farther during soccer games, swim faster during swim meets, flip more in dive meets, hit a softball harder, and have better Halloween costumes than anyone else. I still have a pretty strong competitive edge. My sister Brittney did a nursing internship earlier this summer in Arizona. She and 12 other students/teachers were staying in a hotel for 3 weeks. They had no oven to bake in and no stove to cook on. All they had was a crock pot, an electric skillet, a George Foreman, and a dull knife. She was in charge of making dinner every Saturday. I spent hours racking my brain and researching super delicious and easy recipes for her to make with her limited tools because I wanted all the other people she was with to think she was the best cook. I wanted them to look forward to Saturdays because she was making dinner.

* I learned the importance of self-respect, I learned to be an artist, I learned the importance of an education, and I learned to savor the little moments in life - all from my dad.

There are so many other wonderful lessons I learned from my father. I'm sure there are many things I learned from him that I don't even realize. Growing up my mom would always tell me I was my father's daughter because of all the similar traits I shared with him. While I have developed into my own person now I would still say that without a shadow of a doubt I am my father's daughter. Words can't describe how thankful I am for the father I have, for all the lessons he taught me, for the person I am today because of him.

I love you dad.

Happy 50th birthday!

Courtney

Happy Birthday to Brad T. Andersen

I love birthdays. Like really love them. So whenever Brad's birthday comes around every year I always try to make it the best birthday yet.

My dear husband woke up on February 24th to breakfast in bed. Yum.

He also got to pick a present to open after breakfast.

He unwrapped the paper and found this:

To be completely honest, I don't really know what this thing is. He just wanted it, so I bought it. It's some sort of remote for his camera. Like you can take pictures without having to push the button on the camera. He really likes it so far.

When he came home from work for lunch he got to open the rest of his presents.

 An REI giftcard form Sara and Steve!

Some great Kenneth Cole shoes from his mom and me.

And a double waffle iron! He's never asked for something like this and most definitely wasn't expecting it. We've used it several times since his opening it, and it's so cool.

We also upgraded from this:

20 inch 50 pound VCR/DVD combo TV

to this:

40 inch 5 pound flat screen

A long time ago we cancelled our cable because it was ridiculously overpriced. But with this new TV we got a digital antenna and now we get all the local channels. And you know what that means? We get to watch The Bachelor when it comes on TV and not online the next day! Awesome!

One of the missionaries was having a birthday on February 24th too, and they didn't have any dinner plans so we invited them over.

Happy birthday Elder S!

Happy birthday Brad!

Courtney

Hello 23

I started this post a week before I turned 23, now almost 2 months later I'm finally getting around to finishing it.

Per request of my big sister Valeri, a birthday interview with yours truly. I'm sure no one will be interested in reading this besides Valeri, so my dear, this is dedicated to you. Feel free to stop reading and come back later when I've posted more pictures if you get bored. I will take no offense to that.

Favorite thing to eat: Pizza. Any kind. All kinds. Every day. All day. All-time favorite - Mellow Mushroom. Brad definitely never caught the pizza bug, and unfortunately probably never will. He'll put up with it and eat it when I cook it or when I beg to go get some, but if I give him more of a choice he'll always choose something else. I love to save a few pieces and stash them in the refrigerator and eat them COLD in the morning. There's just nothing quite like cold pizza for breakfast.
I also love pasta. Recently I've been on a baked ziti kick. And before that it was cajun chicken pasta.
And you can never go wrong with bread. Sometimes I'll just pull a few pieces from the loaf and chow down. I don't put anything on it or toast it. I love rolls, homemade bread, pumpkin rolls (probably not considered a bread since it doesn't have yeast, but it does have flour - so I'm counting it), French bread, bread sticks, cheese sticks, pretzels, pretty anything with tons of carbs.

Favorite TV shows: The Bacherlorette/The Bachelor. Don't judge. I never really cared for these shows until my best friend Sara introduced me to them. On the night of the season finale, one of our roommates was having a church meeting in our living room, so Sara couldn't use the TV to watch The Bachelor. She decided that she would go accomonder her now husband Steve's TV. And since I didn't want to wait by myself up in my room until the meeting was over downstairs I went with her. And I've never looked back. Yes, it's overly dramatic. Yes, it's completely ridiculous. And yes, it's lame reality TV. But I love it.

We also like to watch Glee. It used to be really good when they would write the storyline and then find songs that fit into want they wanted to show, but now that they're writing more and more episodes around particular songs or artists we don't like it so much.
Raising Hope is a show that we accidentally stumbled upon. Back when we had cable and watched Glee on our TV and not through the internet, we left it on after Glee was over. Raising Hope comes on right after. It's absolutely hilarious, and we got sucked in. We love it because there's no bad language, no innuendos, no sex. It's just a good sitcom about an unusual family.

We also loved the show Outsourced on NBC, but apparently no one else did because it got cancelled.
Again don't judge, but we definitely love us some reality TV. Teen Mom (Brad actually hates this show and leaves the room when I turn it on), and MTV's The Challenge.

Favorite movies: If you know me and are a movie critic, you've learned to not listen to me in the least bit when I talk about movies I like. Why? Because I honestly like everything I see. Granted over the years there are definitely been movies I haven't cared for and haven't even finished watching. But I totally get sucked into everything else. I've only ever met one other person like this - my dear friend Steve. Actually for his birthday, Sara said he wanted some new movies and asked me to pick them out because we liked the same kinds of things. Unless I absolutely LOVE a movie I won't watch it twice. I find no joy in watching something where I already know the ending and how the characters made it there. My all-time favorite movie is The Boondock Saints. I could watch this movie everyday for the rest of my life and never get bored.

                                                       
Actors I love: Hugh Jackman, Jason Statham, Clive Owen, Gerard Butler, Liam Neeson

Musical artists I love: Relient K has always been a favorite of mine since high school.


I also love Toby Keith, Brad Paisley, Taylor Swift, Van Halen, Journey, Boston Metallica, Breaking Benjamin, Alkaline Trio, Bowling for Soup, Cher, Josh Turner, and Nickleback. As evident from this short list of my favorites, I will listen to almost anything and love it. But if I don't absolutely love it, I'll never listen to it again. What can I say, I know what I like, and I stick with it.

Favorite Christmas song: Without a doubt, "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen." Every version I'd heard is just as great as the last. A new favorite (as of last year) is "A Baby Changes Everything." I heard it while watching Faith Hill's Christmas program on PBS at my in-laws on Christmas Eve.




Favorite hymn: I've been told that when I was a baby my grandmother would rock me to sleep while singing "While of These Emblems We Partake," and I've always loved that song. I can just picture my wonderful grandmother lovingly rocking her first grandbaby to sleep and already instilling in her a love of music and the gospel. In fact, that very song was the first hymn I ever learned to play on the piano. And I get giddy when I see 174 on the second row of the hymn number holder by the organ in the chapel on Sunday mornings. As I gotten older and gone over bumps in the road that have seemed to try me to my very core I've developed a new but just as meaningful relationship with the hymn "Be Still, My Soul."

Be still, my soul: The Lord is on they side;

With patience bear they cross of grief or pain.

Leave to they God to order and provide;

In every change he faithful will remain.

Be still, my soul: Thy best, they heavenly Friend

Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul: Thy God doth understake

To guide the future as he has the past.

Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;

...

Be still, my soul: When change and tears are past,

All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.

The topics listed for this hymn are assurance, comfort, encouragement, faith, guidance, hope, patience, peace, and trials. It's amazing how quickly this song seems to pop into my head and how almost instantaneously I feel assured, comforted, encouraged, faithful, guided, hopeful, patient, and my now still soul is filled with peace.

Favorite primary song: "I'm Trying to be Like Jesus"

Favorite scripture story: The brother of Jared. When I was younger my parents taught me that if I had enough faith in God I could literally move mountains. Oh, how I tried to move mountains. I honestly thought in my 5 year old mind that if I just believed hard enough that I could do it, the mountains would move at my command. It wasn't until I few years later when I was old enough to fully comprehend the story of the brother of Jared that I realized not only did I have to believe in myself, but I had to believe in God. I knew I wouldn't be able to move a mountain just for the heck of it, Heavenly Father would need that mountain to be moved and perhaps one day He would entrust me to do it. Only after I thought of that solution on my own, of course. :-) Just like the brother of Jared.

Current church calling: Second counselor in the Young Women's Presidency. This is beyond a shadow of doubt the hardest calling I have ever had. In my home ward we had a good 25-30 young women the whole time I was there, and they still do now. I've always wanted to be part of the young women's organization, because of how much I loved it growing up. We had wonderful activities that taught us valuable lessons. The ward we're currently in is unlike any other ward I've ever been a part of. Only about half of the ward members have jobs, and only 1/3 have cars. Most Sundays we barely fill the chapel and most members have at least 2 callings because of the sheer number of people who attend church but are unable to hold callings. We have 40 kids in primary - all home schooled or enrolled in private elementary schools (most likely paid for with scholarship money). We have ... drum roll, please ... 4 young women. We only had 2 for the longest time, but we just had 2 convert baptisms. There are about 3 young men. The school systems around here are pretty terrible, so as soon as kids turn school age most parents up and move to a different district. Leaving us with no youth. Many Sundays we come to church with a wonderful lesson planned and no girls to teach. When Wednesday comes around we have spent hours planning a fun activity and no way shows. I hate to say it, but I developed an apathy for my calling. Not for the girls. I would do anything to help them out whenever they needed it, but it's hard to constantly care when it seems no one else does.

A calling I would enjoy: Young Women's in a ward with a large[r] youth group.

Favorite holiday: Honestly, it's Halloween. No joke. I love dressing up as someone else and pretending to live in their shoes for a night. I love planning my costume, putting in lots of effort, and having people admire what a great job I did. Egotistical? Yes. True? Absolutely. And let's face the facts, I'm pretty much addicted to candy. So there's no better holiday for me in that aspect. I also love that Halloween is centered around children (if you don't account for the "sexy" [aka. slutty] adult drinking parties). It is a holiday where adults focus on the children in their home and those coming to their home. The children pick their costumes and get to be whatever they want to be for one magical night. Adults carefully pick out candy and treats for the little ones visiting their doorstep during the night. How wonderful! And here's a sneak peak of our fabulous Halloween (stay tuned for a whole post dedicated my favorite holiday):

Favorite candy: Sour Patch Kids and Now and Laters (only the red one though).

Favorite smells: Nutmeg, ginger, and pumpkin (reminds me of Thanksgiving). Nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon, and apples (reminds me of Christmas).

Places I'd love to go: Check out my Pinterest board dedicated solely to the places I WILL one day visit.
http://pinterest.com/candersen/oh-the-places-i-ll-go-someday/

What I want to be when I grow up: Oh, this has been a long road. After changing my college major no short of 5 times and finally receiving my degree in Human Development, I decided I didn't want to do anything with it. Now that I've been a college grad for over a year and a half, I've finally realized what I want to be when I grow up - an occupational therapist. If you don't know what that is, look it up. I have one semester of per-requistes left to take (because I graduated not knowing what I wanted to do with my life and therefore, not having all the classes I needed) and one huge test left to take (ahhh, the dreaded GRE), and I'll be ready to apply to grad school. And yes, you will have to call me Master Andersen when I'm finished.

Biggest pet peeves: All have to do with driving. I don't use the word "hate" loosely here. I hate when people neglect to turn their blinkers off. It seriously drives me insane. I have to speed up and get around them or I literally will go crazy. Do they not hear the blinking sound constantly going off in their car? Or the signal still flashing on their dashboard? And along those same lines, I hate when people don't use their signals at all. How in the world am I supposed to know that you're planning on cutting me off by jumping into my lane while I'm driving 70 miles an hour if you don't signal? People in Atlanta must not know how to use their signals because everyone either has them on constantly or never uses them at all. Some days I seriously yell at people in my car because I get so frustrated.

What I hope to accomplish in the coming year: I WILL run a 5K. My sister, Brittney and I are planning on signing up for one around Christmas time. I WILL apply to graduate school and get accepted. I WILL spend everyday loving my husband even more than the day before. I (hopefully) will develop a better sense of interior decorating. I WILL makes some of the crafts/clothing/home decor that I pin everyday on Pinterest.

----------------------------------

So what did I actually do for my birthday? Well it was wonderful as usual. Brad knows how much I love birthdays (not just mine, but eveyone's) and always tries to make 9-14 extra special for me.

Brad came home from work for lunch and surprised me with Chick-fil-A, one of my favorites. But not so much a favorite for him, so we don't get it that often. He also graciously wrapped a cell phone cover I bought for myself and totally blew me away when I opened a brand new iPod Touch! My 5 year old iPod died just days before and my wonderful husband had already bought me this new one, which turned out to be a fantastic coincidence. The opening night of Wicked also happened to be on my birthday, and knowing how incredibly obsessed I am with it, Brad told me he would be a horrible husband if he didn't take me to see it ON MY BIRTHDAY. It was wonderful.

My mother-in-law, Susie surprised me with some awesome capris, new cutting boards, and new turbie twists. For those of you who don't know what those are, they're small towels with an elastic loop on the back so you put your hair in it, twist and loop it in the back. I can't live without them. You can learn everything you every wanted to know about them and more on their website.

 Brad and I also stopped by the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield. They covered a field in American flags, each one representing someone who had died during the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It was quite the sight to see.

Love, Courtney

free pizza and some more birthdays

We went to my parents house this past weekend and realized on our drive home that we pretty much had no food in our house. So what did we do? We called up Susie (who currently doesn't have a kitchen due to remodeling) and begged her to feed us dinner. "Uh...sure," she said, "I'll figure out something." Thank goodness. Next obstacle, Brad's lunch for Monday. Luckily my dad had sent us home with a whole rack of BBQ ribs. So I whipped up some veggie dip and sent my dear husband off to work with some meat and carrots. I babysat all day Monday, which meant no grocery shopping for me. Hmm...dinner? Brad is currently playing on a soccer team, and they wanted to practice downtown Monday night in preparation for their game today, Thursday. Perfect, I thought. I have a 50% off coupon for a pizza place down there.

After an uneventful and quite boring soccer practice we headed to Max's Coal Oven Pizzeria. Max is a little boy from the oldest class at the preschool I worked at last year. His parents own this pizza place downtown, and for his birthday they took his whole class (about 30 kids) to their restaurant. Upon their arrival back to school, they gave all the teachers coupons. Well, I love pizza, so naturally I took about 5. We've been wanting to get down to this pizzeria for some time now, but our plans never seem to work out, so we were happy we were finally going to get to go.

We walked in and were seated and immediately served drinks. Water for Brad, Sprite for me (hey, we're getting 50% off, I figured I could splurge a little). I handed the waiter our coupon to which he responded, "I've never seen one of these before." I explained where it came from and why I had it. He said, "Awesome. We'll take care of you guys." We never ever ever order appetizers...ever, but we figured with our coupon and all it would be a nice time to do so. Plus I really wanted those yummy sounding garlic knots. Our fantastic waiter brings out not one but two orders of garlic knots and an order of lobster fritters. "On the house. We just doubled you up." "Wow. This is really cool," we thought. I quietly whispered to Brad that I didn't even know Max's last name, and they were treating us like we were really good friends of his family. But I definitely wasn't complaining.

We order a 16" pizza (we're splurging, remember?) - on a side note, do you know how insanely ginormous a 16 inch pizza is? It's huge. We didn't even eat half of it. As we're eating, the waiter comes up and sits down beside us. He was a seriously cool guy. We really liked him. Well, he started talking about the preschool and Max. So, I told him that I was a teacher in the youngest class and didn't really ever get to associate with Max's class. I told him that I had never met his dad and only talked with his mom a handful of times. I even told him I wasn't working there anymore. Well, come to find out, Max's dad (still don't know his name) owns everything in Atlanta that Ted Turner doesn't. He's worth some 250 million dollars. This waiter is the go-to man when Max's family comes in. He is always the one to take care of them. He eventually decided he'd probably better get back to the rest of his customers, and told us to enjoy the rest of our meal. And did we ever. Delicious.

Well, remember how we still had over half the pizza left? He kindly brought us a box and put the rest of the pizza in it for us. "You guys are good to go," he said. What? We hadn't paid yet! "Are you sure?" asked Brad. "Absolutely," he said. So we left him a $20 tip and a nice note and jetted out of there before they could change their minds. This was seriously one of the coolest things that has ever happened to me (I know, exciting life). I have never gotten free food anywhere. Especially somewhere like this, where we ordered a ton of stuff and should have spent a lot of money. I was so excited I called my sister to tell her all about it. (Sorry you have to hear it again BB.) I'll probably still be awing over it for a few more months.

---------------------------------------------

On a completely different and unrelated note, I have yet again missed some more birthdays. August is like a giant birthday on crack. I swear someone is having a birthday every single one of the 31 days in August. Just yesterday was Valeri's birthday.

Photo courtesy of Neil Andersen. Great job Neil.

Valeri is my sweet, down-to-earth, and amazing sister-in-law. Every time I'm around her I'm smiling. I feel like we've been friends forever, even though we've only known each other for 3 years. She's the first one to tell you all about her mistakes and how to avoid making them yourself.  She's the first one to tell you about how hard and yet fantastically wonderful her life is. I've told her several times, but I absolutely love reading her blog. Unlike many of the other family and mommy blogs out there, Valeri tells it like it is. She doesn't sugarcoat anything. She doesn't pick out only the great parts of life and tell you about how wonderful they are. She also tells about the hard parts and how difficult they are. She is great at relating to everyone. She's a perfect writer and is constantly making me laugh as she tells stories about how hectic life can become with two children. She's extremely talented and has been blessed to be able to do what she loves. This:

Aren't we just adorable.

Lend her children out to other people when she tired of them. Just kidding :-) She's an excellent photographer. In fact, more than half of the pictures we have hanging on our walls right now were taken by her. Sometimes I feel like I'm a walking advertisement from her, and I'm sure my friends have gotten tired of hearing about how "my sister-in-law Valeri is a really great photographer...do you have any friends in California?" But she really is great. And I'm not just saying that because we're related. See for yourself and check out her website or facebook page.

We love you Valeri and seriously cannot wait to see you in three weeks at Lake Powell. (Oh, and just for the record, we excited to see everyone else who is going also.)

My father-in-law David also had a birthday recently on the 19th.

David is the most kind and well-meaning person I have ever met in my entire life. He would do anything he possibly could to help anyone out. I've loved living so close to him and getting to know him better. In fact, just the other day I went and surprised him at his house. Just because it's close, and I could. Although I wasn't able to stay long, I enjoyed just sitting and talking with him and hanging out. He is always quick to compliment and is constantly asking about how Killer is. Silly, I know. But I think it's great he cares about our little pup and likes her so much. He's always playing with her when he and Susie come over.

So, here's to free pizza and birthdays!

Love, Brad & Courtney

Another Year, Another Birthday

This is my mother-in-law. She's pretty great. And today is her birthday!

 Happy Birthday Susie! We love you!

And while we're at it, let me just throw some shout outs to the birthdays I've missed recently.

 Jeff: May 9

Baby Todd: July 12

Allison: July 30

I think I got Lori, but just in case:

photo courtesy of Valeri Andersen Photography

Lori: June 19

Brittney (with kitty Yuki): July 6

Thomas: July 8

Happy Birthday One and All!

Love, Brad & Courtney

Happy Birthday Dad!

Today my dad is turning 29 for the 20th time (or maybe he's moved onto to saying he's 39 for the 10th time...not sure).

Graduation April 2010

 Fishing - one of his most favorite things to do. He's obviously good at it. That's one big carp.

 1997 - instilling his favorite activity upon his children. 

Happy 29th, 39th, and 49th birthday dad!

Love, Brad Courtney & Killer