Twelve months of granduer.

It is almost Christmas friends. I am always in awe of the blur that is a year these days. As a little one, Christmas seemed to literally take 365 days to arrive, but in my ripe age of 24 it seems to come quickly. We have so much to be grateful for. We are healthy, happy, and in much lovey-ness. 12 months have passed since our last Christmas post. Those were crazy cool months friends.

January: Out of curiosity we decided to see if we qualified for a home. We did. We were shocked.
February: Creepy guy "Carlos" wants to get to know me. I didn't feel the same. We were further motivated to move. Also, we celebrated one of my favorite holidays: President's day [not really, Valentine's Day].
March: We celebrated our 2 year anniversary of engagement by taking the day off and going to museums and eating fondue. Hear hear!
April: We found some sketchy homes and threw down some moolah offers. But we were denied the stained, musty, blegh homes. We are ever so thankful. The phrase "hootay" was coined by us via a texting accident. Hootay!!
May: We found a home, put an offer down that day, and were in contract within 48 hours. Whew! We closed on our home May 19th. We then got our furry, chewing, gas bag on May 27th. We named her Yuki.
June: Our home hit a high of 95 degrees! So we moved to our "studio apartment" in the basement.
July: 2 years of wedded bliss was celebrated in St. George. I love love love St. George. It was fantastic! We swam, ate steak, watched Tarzan at Tuachan, and 2 am Denny's dessert run. Nuttin' better. I say we make it a tradition. I'm hoping we can go to Little Mermaid next year.
August: Danno turned the ripe age of 24 and had a realization that he is mid way into his late-twenties. It was still scary hot in the casa, but oh so lovely.
September: Danno had his 3 year mark since his mission. Matt and Carla introduced us to Antoine Dodson. We haven't been the same since.
October: Danno got his big boy job! He saw a job posting for Moss Inc. and decided to give it a shot. We were both very excited when he was contacted the same day, within the hour, to come and interview. He went through a series of interviews, 2 rounds really, and then was offered a postition as a technical designer. Hootay!
November: Two words: Arrested Development. I'm in love. Thank you IFC for running re-runs. Happy Thanksgiving! Turkey, bingo, and Ian all amounted to a successful Thanksgiving. We have so much to be thankful for.
December: Danno has been offered another responsibility at work and is now the new CAP specialist for the Salt Lake site. We found a great Christmas app for Auto-Tune Christmas songs which entertained us for a few hours. We are so very thankful for all of our friends and family who support us and make life that much richer. We are grateful for the birth and life of our Savior. We sincerely hope you have also had a lovely 12 months. We look forward to this next year and the changes and challenges it will hold. Loves, hugs, and high fives all around! Merry Christmas!

Celebrity Look Alikes

A few months ago I did a "Which Celebrity Do You Look Like?" face recognition website at the request of one of the young women I used to work with. This was one of my results. Lovely.

BRUCE LEE. Along with several unattractive past politicians from Asia. Several of them were men.

Perhaps you think my celeb match was brightened up by this beauty. Nope. This is Danno. He is a pretty saucy Latina from time to time.

This is Danno's other match. At least it is a man. But we all know Danno can't grow a handsome mustache such as that.

I suppose our faces are too distinctive to compare to any Hollywood beauty. That, or we are really unattractive people. Either way-we're cool.

Pregnant?

Sorry everyone! I realize now that my baby room may be misleading.
I am sadly not preggo! But we are just clearing space for our eventual
baby. I hope mine has as much hair as this little cutie.

Deck the Halls!

This is a little preview of our holiday decor for the year.

The Good. The Bad. And the Ugly.

The GOOD!

The BAD.

The UGLY.

It is a Christmas Miracle!!

Ladies and gentlemen, we now have internet! Whoa. 7 months of dry, desolate tech-less lives. Living frugally has starved us of the shiny, glossy, tickle of the World Wide Web. We be back in BIZ-NAZ now! I know about 3 peeps read this, all of which have already seen my house, but here are some pics if you forgot what it looked like.

Our tiny bed. But in 1-2 weeks we will have a QUEEN size bed. We are just growing up.

This is our deck-but I am sure you figured that one out by yourself.

This is the hallway downstairs that leads to the office/laundry room and third bedroom. The office is way too messy for pictures.

Third bedroom

Here is our plain basement/tv/dart board/ and home of future hockey table top game

Basement Bathroom

Baby room complete with panda footie pj's for our future Canasian babies [Canadian/Asian]

Upstairs hallway complete with regal dog

Upstairs bathroom

Upstairs bathroom again

My beautiful kitchen, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, new cupboards...ahhh.

Living room. I love our great aluminum art and striped wall.

Entry way, complete with new door!

Living room again. Now the dog has her Santa costume on.

The F word.

The infamous "F" word is for morons. Big dumb morons. I have been subjected to some of the world's dimmest men for over an hour.

Actual quote: "But I was like, those "effin" cupcakes looked amazing."

Yikes. I pray for better parenting around the world. If I was running for Miss America, I would wish that all children had nurturing parents...and a Thesaurus. Broaden those horizons boys. I silently pray you are all sterile after years of drunken mishaps during 4-wheelin'

Fancy Pants

I must admit something. I am not the most graceful, most coordinated, most elegant or articulate little lady. I'm "quirky" as my loving mother and mother-in-law say. All this was brought to the attention of the world one Tuesday morning at good 'ol Monte Vista Elementary.

As a married, LDS woman, I wear something I like to call fancy pants. If you do not know what I am referring to, ask your closest Mormon friend. If that friend is me, call me and I'll expound. One morning I was running a few minutes behind so I quickly rushed out the door, smoothed my billowy granola/teacher skirt, and bolted for the car. As I pulled up to the school I saw Mr. Olsen. He is a young, single sixth grade teacher who is very nice. I say hi and wave and waltz into the school like I'm goin' places. I should also preface that I am one of maybe 8 teachers that are LDS at my school. My sweet and bubbly friend Lacy then meets me at the door where we greet and giggle and chat about life when all of a sudden Lacy says, "Oh! Um....Oh...Janelle, your skirt is tucked into your um....your um....pants?" [please take the necessary pauses and voice inflections implied by the punctuation to get the real idea of this humilitating moment] "Ah! Oh Lacy, thank you! I'm so embarrassed..." "Oh Janelle, don't be embarrassed, it's just me." Well needless to say, I'm sure Lacy is out there shopping right now trying to find some fancy pants of her own just incase of a mis-tucking mishap, a strong breeze, or perhaps just some breezy summer skivies.

Back in the swing of things!

Well another year has come again and I am now three weeks into my second year of teaching. It has been wonderful doing this a SECOND time. The first year was so scary. But this year I am much more at ease starting school. I'm still no expert and I have already had a heart-to-heart with my class about their behavior, but I feel much more comfortable this time.

Danno and I were also able to celebrate our second year as married peeps. I am such an advocate of marriage. Who else would tell me when I have stuff in my teeth, listen to me cry about naughty children and dog poop, correct papers, buy a puppy and home with me, tell me my outfit is cute even when it's less than fab, and take care of me when I am all yucky and sicky? The answer is Danno. He is my best friend and I like him a lot. We went down to St. George and had a wonderful time! We saw Tarzan at the Tuachan, ate steak, went shopping and swimming, and lounged by the pool. I love Danno.

Yuki is still a baby to us. We love her most of the time. She is getting her sad surgury on Tuesday and will be sporting the cone of shame. Good luck Yuki!

Annual 4th of July 5K

Angie bought Yuki her 2nd outfit. I was so anti-dressing animals up...until I saw how cute she is. Thank you Jonelle for her first dress!

Chloe is my girl! We are best friends!

Kelsie is from the "hood" in Texas. Actually not, but she sure tries!

Owen likes grapes

Here is the whole running team!

We started off our 4th of July like we usually do: by running in the Sandy 5K! Tanner took 3rd place in his age group, Evonne took 1st, and they both got sweet prizes! We eventually had a BBQ later which explains the last half of the pictures.

Yuki + Guido = BFF

This is the photo recap of Yuki and Guido. Guido is Danno's cousins Matt and Carla's pup. They have a love hate relationship because Yuki often kicks Guido's trash.

Catching up!

Baby Yuki tolerates my love

Baby Yuki loves Danno

The Champ Fam

Owee is allergic...but this was before we found out :(

The Domm Fam

The Kunz Fam

The Hilbigs @ our new house

Baby Yuki

Ok, here I am evading the heat of my casa and TADA! there is internet. So here is the picture portion of our life.

M.I.A.

Sorry folks! Danno and I have had many life changers but unfortunately we don't have the internet! My iPhone won't let me update blogger so here I am writing a lame post with no pictures! We got our home! Hooray! We love it so much. It is about a billion+ degrees inside due to the lack of air conditioning. We also got a cute little puppy named Yuki. She is so much fun! She is an American Eskimo. We have all been battling the heat of the pretty new home. Poor Yuki crawls in our freezer when the door is open. So to sum up our life: House=amazing independence and scary morgage, puppy=like a new baby and chewed up furnature, Danno and Nellie=pure bliss.

Life is sweet.

Danno studying hard for finals

Although the Utah weather is throwing us for a loop, Danno and I couldn't be happier. Danno just finished his semester and is enjoying a little break before he starts his summer semester and my work is getting a little smoother. Danno is looking for drafting jobs and beginning his life in a grown up job [sorry RL-red lobster-you just suck sometimes]. He also thankfully passed his marriage and family class. And work for me is getting better. End of year testing starts next week and I feel like I am finally making some progress with some behavioral issues with students.
Danno and I are also in contract for a home in Sandy near his parents. We love it and hope everything works out. We were supposed to close in three days, but due to a snag from the seller it could be a few more weeks. We cannot wait to have a little home! Plus a little home means a little puppy.
However, it has been a hard week for my little heart. If you watch Lost and aren't caught up-this is your spoiler alert so stop reading or skip over this.
I'm pretty sure I cried harder when Jin and Sun died than when my dog died. I love tv. I always have. I used to draw pictures of my family and I would include the tv. I would draw arms and legs on it and we were always holding hands. Call it what you want.