on my mind

We got to go celebrate a pretty fantasmagorical day with the Beckerts last week. Ms. Tori Elizabeth Beckert got married!!! Now she is Mrs. Tori Elizabeth Reeves! It was such a great day and I loved every minute of it, but I completely loved the temple. There is nothing quite so satisfying as seeing another family member you love make it to the temple. There was an incredible peaceful feeling there all day!



Every time I think of the temple lately, I think of my Anderson family motto: No Empty Chairs. My grandma and grandpa Anderson took advantage of every opportunity to share their testimonies of the gospel of Jesus Christ with us. Family was what mattered most to them and they always said how they want each of us to pattern our lives after the Savior so that when we make it home to Heaven, we get to see each member of our family present. Nobody is left behind, left out, or forgotten.

I love that promise of eternal family. I love that I have been able to start my own family and I love seeing my family grow and grow.

The temple truly is Heaven on Earth and I loved getting to watch my cute sister-in-law and now brother-in-law make promises to each other that will bless them forever.

On a different note.....

It's Spring Break! I'm pumped. I've got senioritis bad. I thought it was bad in high school, but this graduation craving is worse than my chocolate craving, which is surely saying something.

I'm excited that It's finally spring and next week Karl and I are heading down to the land of Bountiful, a cornucopia, a lot of to visit these two stinkers....

We are pretty excited. I never really thought about what it would be like to have all of my siblings grown up, married and scattered all over the place, but sometimes it's hard. I love their spouses super much and love that I get to be an aunt now (that totally rocks), but I do miss getting to hang out with my family on a Sunday, go on weekly walks with my mom, nurf gun wars and water fights, family dinner talks ( oh so many good ones), and lots of other things. Basically family I love your guts and we need to get together again reeeeaaaaallllyyyyy soon because Christmas feels like it was FOREVER ago and I haven't seen any of your faces since then and that frankly bites monkeys!!!

I'm sorry that whenever I blog I seem to rant about nothingness, but here be the thoughts running through my brain and sometimes, it's nice to just get write them out of there.

I'ma gonna keep enjoying this lovely spring day:)

P.S. to self. Sorry to anybody who may be mortified/offended/upset at this link, but I've been laughing out loud at work for the past half hour because of it and I had to share. I love Harry Potter, but this was a pretty funny interpretation:)

Sista Sista (and you other folks)

So I was being all sentimental while working the computer labs (It is the day of love after all) when I stumbled upon Karl and my engagement pictures! It was super fun to look back. I also stumbled upon my sister's engagements (check them out here). Can I just say my sister is B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L!!! I remember thinking, when she was in high school and I was just a little Junior High kid, how pretty she was! And still is. I'm so happy for her and her new lover Jake. They are the cutest couple ever:) Here is a shout out to some people I'm missing terribly right now (a.k.a my familia) and want to tell them how much I love them through this bloggity blog (which I realize is a lot lamer than a phone call, but people, just love me).

Shake (Shae and Jake): You two are beyond awesome! From day one you two have been so great together. I love how much fun you two have with each other and how you're always the life of the party:)


Talon (spoken in a French accent) and Nicolie: Man I miss you guys like CRAZY! I can't even tell you how many times I've passed West Stadium Villa and wished I could pull over to come visit. I miss sleep overs in your apartment and fun chit chats with you guys. Love you guys! Come back soon k:)



Addie Girl: I love your cute little face, the way you squeal and get the cutest smile on your face when you're excited, and pretty much love the little miracle baby you are. I miss you! Come visit your Aunt Tara. I have some new jokes for ya:)


G: Can I just say writing you emails every week is one of the highlights of my life right now! I love finding jokes to send to you and I completely love that you are enjoying them. You've always been awesome at humoring my lameness. You are being an awesome missionary and serving the Lord right now in Iceland and I'm so proud of you for that! I can't wait to have you back though. Can I just say we are gonna party hardy it up in Logan!


Parental Units: I honestly don't have words to tell you how much you mean to me. I can't begin to list all of the things you two do for me on a constant basis. Thanks for picking up the phone whenever you see my number just so this daughter of yours can go on and on and on about the same things. Thanks for supporting Karl and I with school and all of our future dreams and plans. Thanks for being incredible examples of the righteous parents I hope to emulate someday. Dad, thank you for retelling me the jokes I tell you. You will always be my favorite comedic sidekick. Mom, thanks for being a craft making machine and always inspiring me to attempt creativity and try new things. You rock! I love you both to the moon and back!
Karl my love: I know I get to see you everyday (thank you thank you thank you eternal marriage), but I couldn't leave you out of this post. I love that everyday we get to learn and grow together. I love that despite my imperfections, you still love me. I love how excited you get when I pick up chips and salsa at the store, the way you have to make sure our sheets are perfectly straight before you can go to sleep, how you laugh hysterically when we watch the office, and mostly how you are an incredible example to me of following the Savior. I love you forever and for always:)


My wonderful in-laws: I'm so lucky that we live so close to you! Thanks for supporting Karl and I with everything we are doing. Thanks for sharing with us all of your fun plans and dreams for your future and letting us share ours with you. Thank you thank you thank you for feeding us every Sunday (I know Karl still loves his mom's cooking:). Thank you both for being incredible examples of patience, love and righteousness.


Tori and Garrick: Can I just say you two are the funnest couple I have ever met! I love your game of scaring each other, and how you two are so not afraid to speak your mind to each other. I am so excited for you two to be sealed for time and eternity in the temple in just a few weeks! Love you guys.



Emily!!!: You are so so so much fun! I love running into you on campus. You always make me smile. I am completely in awe of your love of running and am excited to run those 9 miles with you (most likely behind you) this July. You are truly so much fun to be around and I love that I get to be your sister-in-law.



Troy (Brent): Seriously, you are the funniest person ever. Favorite memory: the first Sunday I came to hangout with your family and you told Karl and me jokes for three hours straight. I don't know if I've ever been more entertained:) Thanks for being so happy and nice to people. You are a pretty awesome 16 year old soon to be licensed driver!


Dash: Oh puppy, I miss your puppy face. Can I just say that you are the most hilarious dog in da world! Love your furry chin!

Hope you all have a wonderful Valentine's Day. And don't forget share with the people you love how very much you love them.

It Happened

So It finally happened.

The most wonderful Christmas break I've ever had ended and now it's back to school for me and my love. I had a really hard time accepting that my break was over. I cried like a little baby Sunday night keeping poor Karl up way too late in an attempt to console me. I just loved this break so much and it's all to do with how much time we got to spend with our families.

I completely loved every moment we got to be in Bountiful hanging out with my parents and siblings and getting to enjoy spending time getting to know my little niece Addie a little better. I even loved her when she spit up all over me and cried while I held her because she was helping me learn how to be a better baby-sitter (and I seriously need the practice:).

(Just look at how beautiful she is! Sorry to keep stealing from your blog Nicole!)

I loved staying up late with all of them after both family parties laughing hysterically during a few rousing rounds of Bingo and Uno one night followed by some Seinfeld trivia, boxers and briefs, and other games while drinking five bottles of Martinelli's the next night. I loved seeing how all of our in-law additions to both families fit so perfectly and make our families feel a little more complete. I loved opening presents Christmas morning and again being able to hear my parent's bear testimony of the gospel and give council through each gift they gave. I loved going to my in-law's house and spending another three days laughing while we exchanged thought out gifts, played just dance 3, ate the most delicious food (canoli is amazing), and watched some really fun movies together. I completely loved getting to go back to Bountiful for an FHE my dad put on for us that gave me new eternal perspective into the different roles I have while I'm here on this Earth. I also loved when my amazing mom took the time to come up to Logan to spend time with me while Karl was working a late night. It was all so wonderful!

(See, now you all want canoli to. Look at how amazing those are!)

Now we are back in school and each day I become a little more ok with getting back into the swing of things and not getting to see my families as much(cause I'm lucky enough to have 2 now:). This semester has started off pretty good actually, mostly thanks to Karl for being so patient with me and taking the time to help me slowly get back into reality. I really liked the first day of classes and am so stoked for all the classes I get to take. My shifts for work are pretty awesome even though my desire to hit the hay at 10:30 every night is interrupted by one night of work until midnight followed by an early opening shift at seven the next morning ( I know, I'll stop whining). I'm even excited to start Senior Clinic this semester where I get to work one on one with a client and practice speech therapy (I'm extremely nervous and very excited for this one).

So being back has been surprisingly really hard for me, but writing all of this down made me really thankful for the time I got to spend with my families and for the new year that's ahead of me. I even have some awesome, sort of different, new year's resolutions I want to post about sometime to. It's back to the grind for me.

Hope you all are enjoying this lovely winter weather:)

New Title

*Warning, sappy lovey dovey ness below. Read at your own risk.

So I changed the title of my blog to something a little more descriptive of life at the moment.

"Livin' On Love"

This is a fun time of life for us Beckerts, but a challenging time to. We're working hard to provide for our little family, and sometimes, we fall a little short, but it's all good, you know why.....

Because we're livin' on love!

The things that make me smile are waking up every morning next to the man that makes every day a good day no matter what happens, and right now while we are working to help each other progress, that's all that matters.

We like to dream about what life will be like for us over the next five years. We are dreaming about both being done with school by then, living in a neighborhood we love, having a cute little town home or home we decorate all cute-like together, hopefully at least one little kiddo running around to make us smile, and to look back on this time and smile because of all the things we are helping each other accomplish.

And believe you me, we are having a blast livin' on love.

In fact.....

Last Saturday we celebrated our 1 Year Anniversary!

We consider ourselves veterans at this point:) Maybe, ish, nah we're still rookies but we're learning a lot! Just think how much marital wisdom we will gain over the next eternity we get to spend together forever!

Anyways.... Here's how we celebrated year 1 together!

-A trip to the Logan temple. It was fun to do a session together and remember our sealing together:)

-We ate lunch/dinner at Firehouse and remembered fun dates we had there when we were dating, engaged, and then married. We like firehouse almost as much as Chili's which we frequent often.

-We rented Zoo Keeper (Karl humored me) and really liked it! Even Karl laughed and it was a movie with talking animals which is a movie element that renders the movie unwatchable by Karl's standards usually.

-Got Wendy's and had a picnic in our living room.

-Karl watched the Arizona State game whilst I fell asleep by his side. He is very patient with my uncanny ability to fall asleep any time any where!

-We laughed to our heart's content and just appreciated the fact that we get to be together forever! The fun never has to end, and in fact, will just keep getting better.

I love you so much Karl! Thanks for putting up with my inability to stop a project once I've started, for all my tears and stressing about everything from the serious to the down right ridiculous, for the fact that I tickle you even though you don't like it, and all my other weird quarks

And

thank you for always making me laugh when I'm sad, for holding me when I see a commercial that scares me and for never taking me to see a scary movie, for saying what I need to hear when I need to hear it at the most perfect moments, for being the kind of man I can depend on no matter the situation, for having a testimony of the gospel that has helped strengthen mine, and most of all.....

Thanks for picking me to spend forever with.

I love livin' on love with you!

I think I'm a little distract.....Squirrel

I am at work.
It's slow.
I could be doing something productive.
But I'm not.
I have a good reason though.
A few actually.
All revolving around one fantasmigorical event.
dundundun.....

Shae bae bae is getting married in the morning!!!

That's right!

I'm heading to Bountiful right after class today to spend a weekend full of family fun celebrating the wedding of Shae and Jake soon to be Shake:)

(Photo stolen from fb)

Not only do we get to celebrate that incredible happiness,
But this little doll and her parents will be coming for the weekend to!
I'm super excited:)

(Photo stolen from Nicolie's blog)

Therefore no work or learning will probably get accomplished today.

But hey, it's all for a good reason eh:)

Stress Filled Good Times

School is rough sometimes. Period. I've wanted to up and quit so many times this semester it's ridiculous! I know I'm not the only person who feels like this. In fact, yesterday I was venting with my visiting teachers who happen to be stressed up to their eyeballs too and one of them said, "If I wasn't so close to graduating I'd drop out right now." My feelings exactly after this week. No worries, I'm not going to drop out, but I'm so tired already this semester. Christmas break couldn't come soon enough! I'll stop with my complaining and start looking at how blessed I am to even get to go to school right now. And I'm grateful for a weekend filled with family time and hearing uplifting words spoken at General Conference. We have had some fun the past couple weeks though. This handsome man turned the big 23!

Look at him blow out those candles:) What a champ!

My sister Shae had her birthday to on the 19th and my sister in law Emily had a birthday on the 20th! Happy birthday sistas! It was a great week of birthday partyin'!

I hate stress, but I do love getting to appreciate little things more like watching an episode of the Cosby Show with my love after a long day, walking around a gorgeous green campus, looking forward to two weekends in a row spent with family (thanks to conference and Shae bae bae getting hitched!), etc.

Right now I'm going to finish a shift at work and then do an oh-so-necessary deep cleaning of the Beckert Casa since I finally have time to do it justice! Yay for clean! But first, words of wisdom....

I think this quote is fantastic:)

Toodle Loo!