Relocation

So I wanted to write a blog post, mostly for myself so I can remember times like these. I am thinking of also keeping a word document for myself so I can remember more things of my time being married and all these crazy adventures we are having.

Speaking of which, Matt's internship with the church ended and we were down to the wire on where to go for a job. We had plans to move to Indiana as most of you know, but we also wanted to enjoy our summer a little bit so we decided on our way home we would stop by Indiana get all things settled and then have a mini vacation in Virginia. Boy did we have fun.

I had one of the famous baking days with Teri, my mom, and even Alanna joined us this time! We had so much baking all day and we tried out some new things. Alanna made this delicious mini apple crisp thing that just melts in your mouth, I attempted at making an inside out smores that didn't turn out too awesome. We made little sugar cookies with kitties on them for Halloween, and many other things I can't remember right now.

We also visited our ALL TIME FAVORITE Ice Cream place, CARLS

Oh we love this place so much, this ice cream is literally the best. Ask anyone from our area.

One of the best things that happened during our time home was being able to see Baby Tucker! I kept teasing Erica saying that she better have the baby while I was in Virginia so I can see it. She timed it perfectly, because literally the day before we left she had a beautiful baby boy, Tucker.

Doesn't he just look so precious? I have to say seeing one of my best friends since I have known since 3rd GRADE, have a baby was amazing. It really made me stop and think of how all of us are really growing up and moving into this next stage of our lives. It was so much fun being apart of that even for a little bit and I loved going to see him and Erica and getting to met him, and I will for sure stop by around Christmas to see him some more.

Also over the summer we missed the huge get together at the beach with Sharon and everyone. So she was sweet enough to take us down to the beach for a few days and we loved it. We got to hang out with Sharon and Jono and relax by the beach and have a fabulous seafood dinner, we got to see my awesome cousins Colin, Toria, and my Aunt Sharon! [LOVE YOU GUYS, ps we are so loud at restaurants but who cares?]  We had so much fun and thank you for taking us Momma! We loved it.

While we were also home my dad is just amazing, can I just say that? He does a lot of things when it comes to cars, and takes care of our whole family especially his daughter. I am so grateful for him and I know it was a lot getting us all set up but all in all... We are so so grateful for...

Ted! This is Ted our new car, and we love Ted so much. We are so grateful to our family for counseling us and being there for us during this time. It was a big purchase for us and a huge responsibility but we are so grateful for Ted. It is really nice having two cars, especially in a new place.

Now to get down to where we are now. It is a funny story but I will make it short, basically we were literally driving with my mom, Mel, and then Matt gets a phone call for a job offer. He really wanted Matt and sent him over an offer letter via email 2 hours later. So we had a tough decision to make, so we made a pro and con list [yes don't laugh we actually made one] Then we pulled up to a rest stop and told my mom and all signs pointed to this other job. I felt really bad about making my mom an brother drive all the way to Indiana with us [and with a Uhaul mind you] to have to turn around and go to Arkansas.

I was nervous about moving to Arkansas because I was prepared to move to Indiana. I did all my research, and we got housing, the whole nine yards. Then here we were moving to Arkansas and trying to find housing in a day...literally. Luckily we did and we love our new place, I am sure most of you have seen the pictures of our apartment. So far we really like it here and it very green, lots of back roads and it reminds me of Virginia a lot so that helps.

So far the things I have learned about Arkansas is that we are in the south for sure, people are really polite here and they have southern accents. They love using the phrase "ya'll" which makes me smile and they are just genuinely polite no matter were we go so far. Another thing that became completely obvious was the dedication they have for their team down here, don't know them? Well come visit us and I guarantee once you cross the border into the state you will notice you have entered Razorback country.

Matt says we need to fit in and get some Razorback stuff so we can be accepted and make some friends. Sorry I am not changing my allegiance so easily, I will always be a VA Tech fan and BYU because of obvious reasons. Even though we will be here for two years I am not changing that about me, I might get an accent...I doubt it.

So right now this is where we are, Matt is working for HP here in Arkansas for two years and then getting transferred to where they need a tech guy. They say our chances to get back to Virginia are a very very high because we are the only ones in that area. So fingers crossed!

Lastly we stole Zach and Katie's idea for dates. [I am the only one writing on here too, sorry we aren't as cool as you guys; Matt likes me writing on this because he likes looking and remembering the times we had together.] So we are doing ABC Dates, I started it this week with A and it gives us an opportunity to explore our city better. We first went to Arby's for dinner, then to Starbucks for..my favorite fall drink, Apple Cider and played the Alphabet game.

To play this Alphabet game we went back and forth naming things we love in the other person like..
Kristyna;Affectionate
Matt:  Beautiful
You get the idea, and then when we went back to the start of the Alphabet we started naming other things we liked and got creative with it. It even brought up some funny stories from our younger days that we didn't know about each other and it was a lot of fun. We came home and we wanted to watch a movie that started with A, and decided on Anchorman.

I am so grateful for my family and the time they took out to spend with us and guide us. Thank you SO SO Much for everything that you do and I appreciate all the love and sacrifice that they do for us. We are so very blessed with our loving family and I am so grateful to my husband and all that he does for me. I love our date nights and learning new things about him still, we are coming up on two years and I can't believe it! Well I think that is it for now, until next time. 

Updating

Hello, yes I have been bad about my blog. opppsss this is mostly for me anyway so here I am just writing down my thoughts of what has happened as of late.

First of all we moved! woooo now we are in Utah for a minute, or a little longer who knows?

But can I say our view from our temporary home is amazing? It is so beautiful up here and we just love it! We love being close to family too, and even though this happened before we got here I wanted to say for Matt's birthday we went and played at the Nickel Cade.

I thought he looked funny like that so I had to snap a picture, playing whatever video game that was! We love being close to our extended family out here and spending time with them is the best! 

Matt is even spending more time skateboarding with his brother at all the skate parks out here, and I need to get better at taking skating pictures.

On another note it has been one year since Matt and I got married and it has been the best year of my life! I know we are still newlyweds but I just love being with him and spending all my time with him. It has been a great year filled with ups and downs [more ups than downs] and he has been a great husband while I try and be the best wife I can be. 

Now tomorrow is going to be an adventure for me getting my wisdom teeth removed, I am terrified but with Matt beside me I am sure I will be just fine...right?

That is really all that has been going on, Matt loves his internship and he is working very hard and is loving his new job! We don't know yet what will be happening when August comes around. So we will just have to job search and wait and see! Who knows where we will end up in a few months? 

Until Next Time! 

Talkative Tuesday

Just a quick update, yes I was sick this weekend. It was my first time being sick in a while and I felt horrible for being out of commission for 2 days. This is what pretty much happened, started getting sick Friday...Halo came out and Matt played all weekend. I slept, but no he did not ignore me!

Instead he went out got me some medicine, and my favorite soda beverage. [for when I did get better, had my first one last night ahhh]

Then he made me dinner, and sat by me while I took a few naps we watched a few movies, he did the laundry too!
This is what I love to watch when I am sick...LOST

Now we are rewatching it since Matt has watched the whole thing, and the whole time Matt is amazed at all the new things you make connections to since you have watched it all the way through. Love him.

My family checked in on me and made sure I was fine, and today I had a nice little tango chat with my favorite kiddos! I am new at this but here are some of my favorite pictures from that chat. 

This is Savannah Lynn, [aka my nanner] She is showing me what she got in the treasure box today! She is in kindergarten already can you believe it?! [It is a pumpkin eraser if you couldn't tell :)  ]

Eliza Ann was also excited to talk to me for a second. She said a quick hi and the rest of the time she was running around the room, oh and giving her mother a new hair do.

Logan James was running around too, while also trying to kill his mother's plant by cutting it and was making faces at me the whole time. Such a cute little man!

Baby Ethan didn't want to be kept out of the conversation he seemed to demand my attention. {or just the attention of the phone} and made noises and sounds and I tried to entertain him..before he did this!

Crawled! Right before my eyes! He was using his elbows to make his way across the floor and I barely got this shot cause he was shooting his way to the camera!

Stop growing up when I am not there!

Although I am so glad they did call me, it made my day!

By the way I made this delicious treat for Matt yesterday for taking care of me all weekend.

The Caramel however, was a recipe from Joel so I don't have it! Sorry!

Caramel brownies! 

Well it was a pleasant Tuesday and I just wanted to document it because it made my day with a simple phone call. I have to go now because Matt and I are heading to the temple to finish off the day! 

We are trying to enjoy the temple so close to us while it lasts, because come April we are leaving. We might not be back until our kids decide to go to school here. 

Now now, don't look sad when I say goodbye just like Logan James did. 

More adventures to come I promise and we have a bright road ahead of us!

With the love of our family and friends we can always be happy.

I can't wait to see my family and I am so excited to! I have already promised the kiddos a sleepover with "un" Matt and Auntie KK for christmas!

And a movie...

"Un" Matt and Auntie KK 

are going to spoil those kiddos!

I can't wait for Christmas and my birthday..which by the way is in

17 days!

Hope you enjoyed this picture filled blog post! 

See you soon my dear family and friends!

[Also we will be going to another wedding!]

Until Next Time

Update. Stuffed Shells!

Moving Like A Boss

So as some of you may know we recently moved again and we are in our new place! Ahhh, we love it SO MUCH. 

We are close to campus so Matt can just bike there, although on my days off I like to drive him there so he isn't biking in the cold. We also have a ful kitchen and it is amazing! I have already made cookies about 3 times, with my amazing kitchen aid and done much more. Matt was even amazing enough to do so much when we first moved in. First of all he moved everything out with the help of his co workers in just the hours I was working. So I came back and everything was moved.

Best husband ever? I think so. This is just one snap shot of our place!

Well also get this, during that time I worked 7+ days in a row he also made me dinner! 

He made these amazing stuffed shells! 

As Always, Recipe Time

Stuffed Pasta Shells

Ingredients:

1 (12 ounce) package jumbo pasta shells

 2 eggs, beaten

 1 (32 ounce) container ricotta cheese

 1 pound shredded mozzarella cheese, divided

 8 ounces grated Parmesan cheese, divided

 1 tablespoon dried parsley

 2 teaspoons salt

 1 teaspoon ground black pepper

 1 (28 ounce) jar pasta sauce

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. 

Add pasta and cook for 8 to 10 minutes; drain.

In a large bowl, mix eggs, ricotta, half the mozzarella, half the Parmesan, parsley, salt and pepper until well combined.

 Stuff cooked shells with ricotta mixture and place in a 9x13 inch baking dish.

In a medium bowl, stir together pasta sauce, mushrooms and reserved mozzarella and Parmesan. Pour over stuffed shells.

Bake in preheated oven 45 to 60 minutes, until edges are bubbly and shells are slightly set.




Isn't he just the best? So while we were moving and all that, I finally convinced Matt to go see the doctor about his eye sight. While we were there we recently discovered that he is nearsighted! He was actually amazed at how much clearer everything is when he reads from far away! So now he takes a seat  at the back of the classroom and everything is crystal clear to him! Look at this stud ;)

For Halloween I had to work sadly enough but I got done around 7. All day I wore my outfit to work and it was a T-shirt Matt and I made that had SLENDER on it and the pages. Matt was as you guessed SLENDER. Of course there were a lot of other ones out here as slender man, those copy cats...so instead we decided to hang out with our favorite couple!

Denae and Joel, we just love these guys and we hope they aren't sick of us yet! We also found out that Joel has a hidden talent, he makes the BEST caramel. I am not even joking! So after we had our crock pot dinner we snacked on caramel apples, and candies, while we watched marble hornets. [for those who don't know it is about SLENDER and I even got scared!]

So that is pretty much all that has happened with us as of late, oh and my wonderful Hubby got an internship with the church for this summer! He will be working with them for 4 months and then who knows what will happen? We hope that he can get a job back east but he might need a little more experience before we can do that but cross our fingers we end up back east soon! 

So right now we are looking for places in Riverton, but we are also looking for places around and nearby so if anyone knows anything let us know! 

Also fun note, I will probably be working during the holidays we are away from family and all that so..Matt and I have decided to treat ourselves and go to OUTBACK. Nothing says like, family, home, and deliousness like outback.

Until next time 

Lasagna Crock Pot

Deliciousnesssss 

Ingredients

• 1 Pound of ground beef
• 1 (26 oz) Jar of spaghetti sauce
• 1 Cup of water
• 1 (15 oz) Package of ricotta cheese
• 1 Package of shredded mozzarella, divided
• 1/4 Cup of grated Parmesan cheese, divided
• 1 egg
• 2 Tablespoons of chopped fresh parsley
• 6 lasagna noodles, uncooked

Directions

1. Step One

   Cook the ground beef until it is brown; then drain all that grease. Stir in spaghetti sauce and water. [This is in one pot]

2. Step Two

   Mix ricotta, 1 1/2 c. mozzarella, 2 Tbsp. parmesan, egg and parsley. [Mix these in the other pot]

3. Step Three

   Spoon 1 cup meat sauce into slow cooker; top with layers of half each of the noodles, broken to fit, and then cheese mixture. Keep repeating this process and layer it lastly with cheese on top!

4. Step Four

   Cover and cook on low for 3 hours.
   
   
   Then dish it out and serve!
   
   
   

   

   
   
   
   
   Update On The Wehles:
   
   
   Matt and I have been doing well in Rexburg..with a few problems. It has been quite a crazy month being here at the apartment! The pipes in front of our apartment ironically enough broke about 4-5 times since we have been here. The last time it broke was on Wednesday and it flooded our whole apartment, it came in through our light fixture in the kitchen and it broke the light fixture and shattered on our floor. I grabbed all the electronics on the floor and placed them in random spots around the room, my neighbor heard me scream and luckily she had TONS of towels! [thank you Jill!] and helped me get all the  water up! 
   
   We also have not had A/C this whole time and it has been about 2 weeks now, the lovely sand flittering in through the water all the time is an added bonus. All of these other problems happened but I do not want to vent! [too much] So Matt and I are moving in with a friend of the family and they are so nice to help us out! We really are grateful for the help and we will be living there until January when we come back for winter semester. Then we will move to another complex and we are excited for all the moving we will have to do! [we are becoming pros at it] 
   
   
   
   
   
   So we will be moving this week and we are excited to have a mini party every day with our friends! I hope you all enjoyed the recipe because it was fantastic! [i got a lot of compliments on it and it doesn't take too long to do! ]
   
   89 days until VA for Christmas, but until then..we will celebrate Halloween! Matt has already decided our costumes! People probably wouldn't get our costume unless they know Matt and I but it is pretty awesome...I will post pictures of our costumes when it is Halloween time! 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   Until Next Time!
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Take That Pocket Kitchen!

Updated the background, do you all like? I miss the trees, so I wanted to put a little green in my life via background!

Anyway so as most of you know [or for those who didn't know] We have moved back to Idaho! We are here for just a few months while Matt finishes up school! We are in a nice little apartment really close to campus and we are doing great!

The apartment is at a great location, and for a great price for the time being we took it! The downside, is there is no kitchen.

I have a pocket kitchen. For those of you who do not know what that means it literally means I have

1. fridge
2. stove burner that plugs into the wall
3. microwave
4. and a sink

So! I came up with a solution....the crock pot!

 Take that pocket kitchen! So now I love my pocket kitchen because the crock pot is awesome!

It has been working great so far, I have found a few websites that have recipes for crock pots and they make tons of food and we have left overs! So here is just one that I have done that takes 24 hours! It really does, but do not worry it is SO EASY and it is well worth it!

Behold The...

Beef Vegetable Stew Recipe!

Oh my, doesn't that just look so good! Anyway this soup is to die for!

First here is what you will need

• 1 Pound of Lean beef stew meat
• 1/3 Medium onion, chopped into large pieces
• 2 - 3 Medium potatoes, peeled and cut into bite size pieces
• 2 - 3 Carrots, peeled and cut into bite size pieces
• 2 Cans of Tomato sauce
• 1 (14.5 oz) Can of Green beans, drained
• 1 (7 oz) Can of Whole kernel corn, drained
• 1 (8.5 oz) Can of Sweet green peas, drained
• 6 - 7 Beef bouillon cubes

Step 1:

First you will want to cook your meat, just to get it a nice brown color! You can add pepper and salt to it if you so desire. [I personally didn't because I wanted that full meat taste!]

Step 2:

After cooking the meat, drain all that oil and fat out and just place the meat in the crock pot! Along with those carrots, onions, and potatoes. [I kept my potatoes peeled just because I love skin potatoes!] Then add the tomato sauce, and water. [add as much water as you want but be WARNED the water will evaporate over night, I noticed this and added more to it than I thought I needed to. it was perfect! I would suggest adding enough water so that you can not see your ingredients as much]

Stir all the ingredients you placed in the crock pot and let it sit on HIGH for an hour.

Step 3: 

After the hour is up, put the crock pot on low for the next 24 hours! [I know crazy right? but TRUST ME, best thing ever! The meat with just melt in your mouth and pull apart because it has been sitting in that crock pot for 24 hours!]

Step 4:

About an hour before you serve this delicious dish, add the rest of your ingredients to the crock pot, [green beans, peas, corn, bullion cubes] stir it in and put it on high for the last hour. Wait until the cubes are dissolved and bam!

delicious crock pot beef vegetable soup! 

Matt was very happy with my creation... too bad it was horrible timing, our A/C has not been working this three day weekend and so naturally why not make the soup. We ate it slowly and over a period of an hour just because we were getting so hot!

Hope this recipe was useful and you all enjoy it and try it for yourselves!

I do love posting recipes I just need find more time to do so, I will post some more soon.

Matt and I were teasing saying that we have been so good about going to temples lately, here is a few snap shots of when we went to these weddings!

Mike Hortman's wedding in Salt Lake

David and Elise's wedding at the Manti Temple [new sister!]

One of my best friend's Courtney Themer got married to this sweet man Steven Porter, right before we left!

Love you guys!

Aww the joy of weddings

So as of right now Matt and I are living it up in Idaho for the next few months, but we will be home for Christmas! Thank you frequent flyer miles! Defiantly helped us to get home, but we still need to get tickets back to Idaho! [haha ooppss?] 

My sister Alanna has a count down of when we return for Christmas, as of an hour ago it is 102 days!

But as of right now, Matt and I are enjoying being married and settled into our little apartment! He loves the tv in here [ of course it is HD ] and we are enjoying hanging out with all of our married friends up here! It is so great to be apart of the married club! Marriage is a great thing and to have that constant support and companion in someone, I am truly blessed. 

I love my husband!

Hope everyone enjoyed their weekend!

Until Next Time! 

Catching Up

I am so sorry to anyone who actually read this I have not updated in quite sometime!
The time I was going to update we got a storm that came out of nowhere and knocked our power out for 4 days!

There is just one of the trees that I saw as we were driving down the main road in our city of Stafford. It is so crazy that pretty much everyone was without power for days, and even weeks!

Luckily we all got our power back in a few days and we were able to save our food and nothing got destroyed!

Now around that time I was surprisingly still cooking and my mother in law was one of those people that did not even have to go without power! So we were over there often helping with cooking, cleaning, and helping those who didn't have power put things in the fridge and store at their house for the time being. Around that time I decided to tackle this peanut butter cookie recipe, with a Hershey kisses in the middle!

My Aunt Sharon can tell you that these cookies are my favorite, and I only cherish them around Christmas time. I feel as though I can not make the cookies as good as she can so I just have never tried, well this time I really thought I would give it a go! Let me tell you, I think I did a pretty good job! They turned out great and eventually within the first hour or so of making them they were pretty much all gone too! 

Also around this time ironically enough, Beau and Teri were moving out with all this heat and no power and we were moving down in the basement. It was a bit bitter sweet just because I had gotten so used to just running down stairs and seeing the kiddos and them whenever I felt like it. Now I can't do that,now I have to travel 5 minutes to their house, and Matt and I are in the basement! We love being down here and having all this space, but once again irony will not let us live this down. We are moving back to Idaho...in 2 weeks!

Yes we will be traveling back hopefully for the last time! Matt has to finish up his last year at school and so we will be in Idaho until April. Although I am trying to have a positive outlook on things, we will be back in Idaho but we will be married now! No more rules I have to follow as a single student, and this way I can feel a little more grown up living in an apartment with just Matt and I! I am excited to be on my own with Matt for a bit and being newlyweds out in Idaho. We might come back for Christmas, but that is still up in the air! [Yes plane tickets are expensive! Especially when you pay for 2 people now!] We have a cute little studio apartment close to campus and not out of the way of anything, it was newly remodeled this past year so everything is new! It is also furnished which is great because I was worried about getting furniture out there! So whew, thank goodness for that! 

By the way a lot of other things have happened that have kept us busy, including giving a talk in church last week! As a newlywed couple, gosh I was nervous but I am pretty sure it went well! We went to Youth Conference to support my cousins, brother, and brother in law as they danced and sang in this performance! My niece Eliza Ann [age: 3] gave her very first talk in primary yesterday and she did such a great job we are all so proud of her! 

Now here is me in action! My mother, Matt and I just spent pretty much our whole day in Wegmans on Saturday! Pretty much the best grocery store there is out there, although you will get lost and just add more stuff to your cart than you thought you would! We also had the missionaries over for dinner yesterday and we had a seafood buffet! It felt like Christmas Eve! [Although it was a quarter of the food we actually serve and make that day!]

My family and I are seafood people, and we have tons of seafood recipes passed down in the family line. A lot of them I actually will not post the recipes because they are just that good ;) but I will share with you what I made yesterday which is always a big hit and very easy to make!

Marinated teriyaki sauce bacon covered scallops! Now the actual recipe calls for all sorts of things, but I am going to give you the easy version on how to make these delicious appetizers! 

First grab one of these...

This pretty much has all the ingredients that we usually put on the scallops anyway so we just used this for a quick serve! First grab your scallops and depending on how big they are you can cut them in fourths, or just halves. [I usually do fourths because it is hard to wrap them up!] Next you will have to pour ALL [yes I mean all, dump that whole bottle] into a bowl and place the scallops directly into that bowl, then place them in the fridge for about 2-4 hours to marinate. Once they have been all marinated you take them out of the fridge and get your bacon! If you buy a half a pound of scallops cut them into fourths, one package of 12 bacon strips should be fine.

Then as shown in the picture cut the bacon strips in half so you can roll about 22-24 scallops. Take out the scallops one by one and start to roll them up in the bacon. Place a toothpick in the middle to keep it from falling apart and running away from you! Then dip the bacon in the teriyaki sauce and place it on a tray [Covered in foil! This is important or it will be VERY hard to scrub] After placing them all on the cooking sheet covered in foil, place in the oven on BOIL, and let it cook for about 8-10 minutes or until they start to darken just a bit. If they burn a little that is quite alright they will just be a little crispy!

Then yummy dinner is served! Hope that this recipe was useful and easy to understand! I will try and post every week again the power outage kind of threw me off a bit but I am back! This has been a great couple of weeks and this coming week we will be heading to water country usa! I am so excited and I also hope everyone is enjoying the summer Olympics my family and I are all really into it this year! 

Go Team USA!

Until Next Time!