Honeymoon Part 2...

Just looking at these pictures from our Honeymoon again makes me long to be somewhere warm. The cold weather is starting to creep in and I have a love/hate relationship with it. I LOVE that fall is so pretty and that the leaves are changing and falling from the trees. I HATE that it means that snow is coming. Snow is always so exciting and pretty the first couple of snow falls. But then it seems to stay and never go away. I love it for skiing but I hate it for driving.

Anyways, back to this post. Sorry for a bit of a tangent there...

These pictures came from Preston's camera. Consequently there are some goofy ones of me. ENJOY!

I love these chairs! They are so huge that you feel like such a little person sitting in them! 

Yours truly!

Preston and I all snuggly waiting in a lounge before we could be seated for dinner. Isn't that zebra couch AWESOME??

Walking around in the flea markets in Puerta Vallarta. We stopped to try on these cool hats!

Us in front of the Carnival Splendor.

Beautiful Sunset and beautiful boy!

Probably the prettiest sunset I have EVER seen! It took quite a few attempts to take this picture...it is always so windy up there! 

Me and the hubs.

Love this

The Arch in Cabo. Absolutely breath taking.

Me on the glass bottom boat before we went to "Lovers Beach". If you ever get the chance to go to Cabo, you have to go to Lovers Beach. It is a blast! The waves are so much fun to play in and it is a great snorkel spot too!

The other side of the arch. They said it looks like a dinosaur drinking out of the water. Can you see it?

Cute little crabs that were everywhere!

MINE MINE MINE!

The ship!

Us on one of the last days of the cruise! 

Our yummy drinks. I forget what they are called but they were seriously delicious! They were our favorite things on the cruise. My personal favorite was this. The chocolate melting cake. I ate it EVERY NIGHT. It is THAT good. If you ever do a Carnival Cruise, you have to indulge in one of those. 

seriously, heavenly. :D

Down on the Ranch

Last week we ventured down South to Preston's family ranch. The whole purpose of this trip was for me to shoot a deer. Me, not Preston. I know, it still makes me laugh thinking about it. Every year my Dad puts me in for a hunt of some sort and this year I drew out for the Muzzle Loader hunt. For those of you who don't know, a muzzle loader is a big, noisy gun that uses black powder (that's as much as I know about it at least). And I was supposed to shoot a deer with that thing! I haven't ever shot a living thing in my life, let alone anything with a gun that size, and I was expected to shoot a deer with this complicated fire arm. YEAH RIGHT! That's what I kept telling myself. But I knew Preston would be so proud of me for killing my own deer so I committed to at least give it a try and if I happened to screw up somehow, Preston would take over from there. 

So off we went to the field where the deer usually trickle in and would be so easy for me to shoot. Unfortunately, we sat there for about two hours or so and the deer never came. As much as I hoped I wouldn't have to shoot one on my own, I kind of hoped I would get the chance so I could impress my husband. Oh well, I'm sure there will always be a next time. I don't think Preston will let me off that easy...

My parents were on a cruise to the Caribbean so my younger sister, Emily, got to hang out with us for the whole weekend! She is such a hoot to be around! She always keeps us laughing! 

Emily and her socks! 

Such a stupid picture of myself, but Preston made me wear these in case I had to shoot the gun since it was so loud. I look a bit ridiculous. 

Me and my cute hubby off to go shoot us a deer (or so we hoped!)

Smoochin' on the Ranch!! I just love him! 

The beautiful view from our hiding spot from the deer. 

Emily kept the fire burning for us! 

Daisy Dog! She isn't ours but I wish we had a doggie of our own! 

My brother-in-law Chad and his sweet baby girl, Kylie.

Preston etching our initials into the rock= pBs

The ranch is truly a beautiful place. It is so peaceful and relaxing. I just love it there! It makes me want a ranch of my own someday. Who knows, maybe we will! 

Charity Never Faileth

President Monson is truly a Prophet of God. I know it with all of my heart. I know that the talk he gave in the General Relief Society Meeting just a couple of weeks ago was inspired. Here is a little excerpt from his address:

"A young couple, Lisa and John, moved into a new neighborhood. One morning while they were eating breakfast, Lisa looked out the window and watched her next-door neighbor hanging out her wash.

“That laundry’s not clean!” Lisa exclaimed. “Our neighbor doesn’t know how to get clothes clean!”

John looked on but remained silent.

Every time her neighbor would hang her wash to dry, Lisa would make the same comments.

A few weeks later Lisa was surprised to glance out her window and see a nice, clean wash hanging in her neighbor’s yard. She said to her husband, “Look, John—she’s finally learned how to wash correctly! I wonder how she did it.”

John replied, “Well, dear, I have the answer for you. You’ll be interested to know that I got up early this morning and washed our windows!”

Tonight I’d like to share with you a few thoughts concerning how we view each other. Are we looking through a window which needs cleaning? Are we making judgments when we don’t have all the facts? What do we see when we look at others? What judgments do we make about them?

Said the Savior, “Judge not.”¹ He continued, “Why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?”² Or, to paraphrase, why beholdest thou what you think is dirty laundry at your neighbor’s house but considerest not the soiled window in your own house?

None of us is perfect. I know of no one who would profess to be so. And yet for some reason, despite our own imperfections, we have a tendency to point out those of others. We make judgments concerning their actions or inactions.

There is really no way we can know the heart, the intentions, or the circumstances of someone who might say or do something we find reason to criticize. Thus the commandment: “Judge not.”"

It was such an awesome experience to attend the Conference Center for the Relief Society Meeting. Their is such an incredible Spirit that is felt when you are in that building. My favorite feeling is when the Prophet enters the room and everybody just goes completely silent. Second favorite feeling: when the congregation sings. It is so powerful and beautiful. I absolutely love it! I love living so close to the Conference Center. I feel so blessed whenever I get the chance to hear the Prophet speak to me in person. He is an incredible man and such an inspiration to me.

The beautiful Salt Lake Temple! 

(Heidi S. Swinton - the author of Thomas S. Monson's Bio)

After the Relief Society Meeting they were doing a book signing for President Monson's new Biography. It was really neat to sit and listen to the author's experiences of visiting with the Prophet and learning about his life. We got really lucky and got a copy of his Biography that was signed by the Prophet himself! It really is a great book and so inspirational to learn about such a remarkable man's life.

If you don't have this book yet, you should! Go here to get your very own copy! You won't regret it! 

What's Old is New...

Apparently, we love old stuff. We are living in a cute little old home right now, which we love, but we can never hide the fact that it is old. 

But the house wasn't enough for us so we searched and searched on KSL for one of these:

A camp trailer!! Yeah, it's a little old. But we love it!! We have high hopes for this thing. It's going to go lots of places with us. 

Proud new owner!! :D 

The "DeVille"

The first big adventure for this baby will be to ALASKA! We are already planning our summer vacation road trip to there for next summer. We can hardly wait! Bring on some serious fishing!! :D

Honeymoon

My cute husband and I got to bask in the sun for an entire WEEK on a cruise to the Mexican Riviera. What a way to start off your married life together! They cook your food for you, make your bed, always have clean towels waiting for you in your room and seriously wait on you hand and foot! We absolutely loved it! Preston was able to practice up on his Spanish (which he is so good at but will never admit it). Since Preston is so fluent, naturally, all of the Mexican people he talked to thought I was fluent too...YEAH RIGHT! I would just nod my head when they would talk to me or say "Si" or a simple "No se". I'll have to practice before we venture that way again. :D

Here we are almost to the cruise ship! We drove a whole ten hours to LA to board our ship and it was never a dull moment the whole way there! 

My sassy husband trying out these awesome chairs on the deck. Seriously, is he really that cute!?? Oh yea...

Here we are on our formal night of the cruise. It is so fun to dress up and go to a fancy dinner. Plus, it doesn't hurt when your husband looks so stunning in a suit. 

Here we are in Puerta Vallarta! (Sorry for the un-rotated pictures. My computer will not let me fix it. If anyone knows how to fix it, let me know!!)

I LOVE the streets in Mexico! The brick and stone roads are just so cute! 

They had these sand sculptures all along the beach. Here is one guy working on his. They make money off of them by having passers by give them tips. I thought it was cool so I definitely donated to him! 

Walking the streets of Puerta Vallarta! 

One of the beautiful churches in Puerta Vallarta.

Okay, I really think America should build walls like this. They have so much more character! 

Sittin on the dock of the bay...:)

At "El Set"

Apparently, this is Puerta Vallarta's claim to fame. It had the most beautiful view from the balcony.

We went on a tour of a Tequila Factory. Out of the 3 couples on the tour, two of those were Mormon. Consequently, our guide didn't get much business out of our group!

The bees sure seemed to enjoy it though! They were all over the place! 

On our tour of Puerta Vallarta, we got to eat lunch in the Jungle. It was gorgeous! Our table overlooked a little river. After we ate, Preston & another guy from our group decided to go for a dip. They had a lot of fun!

So I'm getting ready for dinner one night on the cruise, and I come out and find Preston just watching TV. I couldn't help but take a picture! He is the cutest guy ever! I love him! 

The Splendor as we sail away from Puerta Vallarta.

Riding in the coolest little taxi in Mazatlan on our way to go snorkeling! 

We refused to do excursions through the ship because they were so dang expensive. Luckily, we found this little boat to take us over to Deer Island (the snorkeling island) for only ten bucks! We paid him up front and he still came back later in the day to pick us up! Those Mexicans were so trustworthy! 

Our snorkel spot

Right after we went body surfing and Preston said a sand shark swam right up next to me....luckily I didn't see it. I'm deathly afraid of even the smallest minnow, let alone SHARK!

Beauty.

I want to go back so bad!!! Maybe one day we will...

Honeymoon pictures to be continued...my camera died on the trip and we took the rest of our pictures with Preston's camera.