Home Sweet Home

We're finally settling in our new home. We even own some furniture now. We bought a dining room set in Provo before we left so we would have somewhere to eat when we got here, and we figured we could handle everything else once we started to settle in. We bought our couch and ottoman before our vacation so it was delivered two days after we got home, which was great timing.

The ottoman is great because the cushions flip over to be hard wood trays we can use as a table, and it has lots of storage space inside. We also bought some bookshelves to store our stuff. It's finally feeling like a home and we love it. Come visit us... we even have a guest room for you to sleep in.

On the Coast of Somewhere Beautiful

Joseph and I had not taken a real vacation together in all our 3+ years of marriage until last week. We did have a little honeymoon in San Diego, but it wasn't very long because we had to get back up to school, and it rained the whole time (starting the night we got there, ending the morning we left). We didn't get to enjoy the beach at all. So, now that Joseph is done with school we decided it was time for us to take a nice long real vacation somewhere we had never been before. We ended up in the beautiful Bahamas. It was so incredible. The weather was sunny and perfect. The water was the most amazing turquoise blue. The sand was soft and white. Basically, it was paradise.

We went scuba diving...

(I touched the gigantic fish in this picture, he was about half my size, maybe bigger!)

... sailing...

... rode the bus downtown...

... shopped...

... enjoyed the view from our room and the hotel balcony...

... and relaxed on the beach in the warm sunshine...

There is no other way to describe it than to say it was perfect. We loved it and we're happy that our pasty snowy acclimated Utah skin didn't fry in the hot and intense Bahama sun. We miss the beautiful tropical island but we're excited to get on with real life.

Once, Twice, Three Times a Graduate

Back in 2006 I had the wonderful opportunity of graduating with my beautiful wife, Laura.

We completed our undergraduate degrees together and I immediately enrolled in graduate school, which meant another three years of paying tuition and only earning a real income for four months every year (Laura was very supportive and did work full time for 2 of those years).

Those three years have finally come to an end. I have completed and defended my thesis and completed all 90 credit hours. For all of that hard work I have been rewarded a MS in Manufacturing Systems...

...a MBA with an emphasis in Global Supply Chain Management...

...and a job with Honeywell International as a project manager in Phoenix, AZ.

We are very excited to be finished with school and taking our places in the real world and of course, earning a real paycheck.

We would also like to thank all of our family for being supportive and understanding when our student budgets have not allowed us to travel to all of the wonderful family events that we would have enjoyed attending. We will make a purposeful effort to see all of you a little more often.