Cinco de Mayo 2012

The day I've been looking forward to my whole life finally came! Cinco de Mayo 2012 I married my best friend Josh Peterson in the Denver LDS temple for time and all eternity! We were surrounded by family and friends and we certainly felt their love and support for us. It was an incredible day that seemed to just be PERFECT. I kept waiting for something to go wrong (because I was told that something always does and I wanted to be prepared) but nothing ever did. I didn't even wake up with that giant pimple that I swore was going to magically appear that morning. It was warm and overcast, which was great for pictures, with no rain! We didn't forget anything important, our car didn't break down, we didn't get lost, the photographer was there on time, nothing broke, no one got sick and it was just a perfect day. I cannot express how grateful I am to those who helped out with making everything go so smoothly and made this wedding possible.

But my main thanks goes to my amazing mom. She did it all. The decorations, she organized and bought the food, the housed our family, helped with picture taking, made my cakes, ran countless hours of errands, she tried on dresses, helped with shoe shopping, was there to set up and take down and so many other things that went into this stressful, crazy amazing day that changed my life forever. Thank you mom. You are truly incredible!! I know you still haven't completely recovered from the hectic event but know that I am grateful for you every day for everything that you do for me. And on the bright side, you've married off all of your girls to wonderful men and you don't have to worry about another wedding (that involves one of your children at least) ;)

There is just so much that I could say about the events of the past couple weeks but I just can't say it all! My wonderful sister Alyssa took bridal/groomal pictures for me and Josh a few days before the wedding. We were so grateful for all the time that she took in doing this for us! She did an amazing job! It was another beautiful day full of clouds for better picture taking. It was a family affair! My mom, dad, Alyssa and Chelsea were there and I had a lot of fun. I was also so grateful for Chels and all that she did for me for the wedding. She was the makeup artist and hair stylist! She made me look beautiful! Chels definitely has great talent and I am so grateful that she could share those talents with me on my special day.

I thought I would share with you some of the pictures that were taken on that day. There are some more that I don't have, so I will share those whenever I get them.

I like this picture because he was actually leaning in to tell me he loves me :)

This is definitely one of my favorites! I love artsy pictures!

OH he is dang handsome!

This one was just silly. Sleeping beauty?

Alyssa Paul Photography

In three days...

I will be getting married to my best friend in three days! Time has gone by so fast! It seems so surreal that I will be a WIFE in three days and I will have a HUSBAND. I am wondering when this is actually going to feel real? But I love all the feelings and excitement that I have had and the journey that we have taken to get to where we are. Life has been crazy and exhausting these past few weeks. Who would have thought there is so much to do for a wedding. I had two amazing bridal showers in Colorado (I will post more later), my sisters are in town from Idaho and Mississippi, lots of shopping and getting ready for the big day and more family coming in to town (like my Grandpa from Puerto Rico who comes in today!). Life is busy, tiring, and wonderful right now. I will have many more adventures to post about soon. As for the next time I will post about my bridal showers, wedding day and honeymoon...  those will come in about two weeks time. I can't wait to share our many adventures with you when we get back!

(this is me having so much emotion bouncing around inside me, but not knowing what/how to express it)

14 days (almost 13). 2 weeks. Too many hours. Way too many minutes.

It seems SO close but yet it seems so far. I feel like we have everything ready but at the same time so much stuff to get done. My overall feeling: I just can't wait. I know that no matter what happens between now and then and no matter the circumstances of the actual day that it is going to be perfect! I cannot describe how excited I am to marry Josh. Being back home in Parker until the wedding I have been getting people asking me the stupid question of "Am I excited??". Of course I'm excited people! But it is hard to describe the intensity of the excitement that I have.

My life will be changing for the better and in so many different ways in 14 days. I am so in love, and just so happy. It is hard to think that over the eternity that we are married that our love will only grow. Some people take love for granite. Some deny that it truly exists and some people abuse it. I hope that each day I can learn more about how to truly, fully, in every sense of the word, love. I cannot wait to try and be the best wife that I can be. I already sit and think of ways to keep life interesting and to find fun ways to always serve Josh and always show him that I love him, even when life is busy or hard. I know that Josh is going to be an amazing husband and I always want him to  feel the love, gratitude and respect that I have for him.

Sorry for a little bit of the mushy gushy random babble people, but I just had to try to write how I feel. I am going to burst with so many great emotions running through me at once!

Life is so good. Embrace it. Find the good. And love. The world could use some more lovin'.

'Cause this is Africa!

Josh had a presentation in his International Business class last week and so he dressed up for it! He got this outfit on his mission in Mozambique, Africa. Oh that boy. He wore it all around campus. And I was a little embarrassed. But at the same time, it was awesome and he is awesome. Way to be different babe! :) My favorite part about it all was all the looks that people gave us when we were walking around. It put a smile on a lot of people's faces, we got a few "wows" and many people laughed out loud as they walked by. At the very least Josh brightened a few people's days. Even a lady in our New Testament class stopped him to get a picture of him.

Oh, life will never be boring with you Josh! Thanks for always keeping things interesting! :)

p.s. Please take me to Africa...

Mormons and Coffee?

Josh and I were driving and I saw this sign that I thought this was a pretty ironic sign to see. "Free Coffee with BYU ID". If you don't understand why that is ironic, I'll give a brief explanation. BYU is a school with a majority of LDS students. Well being LDS we believe in something called the Word of Wisdom. On lds.org it states explains that "The Word of Wisdom is a law of health revealed by the Lord for the physical and spiritual benefit of His children. On February 27, 1833, as recorded in section 89 of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord revealed which foods are good for us to eat and which substances are not good for the human body. He also promised health, protection, knowledge, and wisdom to those who obey the Word of Wisdom." Included in the Word of Wisdom is no drinking hot drinks, such as coffee. So when I saw the sign that says free coffee with BYU ID, I wasn't sure what these people were trying to do. Was it a joke? Or just a genuine try to get BYU student in to their store? Either way, I got a good enough laugh to pull aside and take a picture.

“One keeps the Word of Wisdom knowing that obedience will not only bring freedom from addiction, but it will also add blessings of wisdom and treasures of knowledge.”

—Russell M. Nelson

Easter

Easter was a great break for us all.  It was full of fun, candy and lots of Easter egg hunts (not just for the little  guys either :) ) We were able to get in on the action twice during the weekend, once at my (josh's) aunt Debby's house and the other at the BYU football stadium.  Every year we do two hunts at my aunt's house, one for the little kids and one for the adults.  As you can see in the pictures below the little kids had a blast in the living room.  As far as the adult hunt goes, we decided to throw a new little twist on things and do it at night with flash lights (not as easy as you think, just ask Emily. She got a grand total of 3 eggs)  There were about 15 of us who participated in the hunt so we were told that we could each get 12 eggs.  I was able to snag 18 of them which helped with Em's measly 3 :) but in the end we came out short handed.  Apparently there were a few miscalculations and they didn't have as many eggs as they thought.  Though we were short in the end by 4 eggs we still came out winners.  These eggs were not filled with candy but rather money and gift cards.  We had a great time.  Thanks Aunt Debby!

Note to future single BYU students: if you get an email about a huge Easter egg hunt at the Football stadium IT IS NOT ACTUALLY FOR YOU!!! It is for kids ranging from 0-10.  Well we didn't get that memo and guess what we did, we went and maybe possibly might have participated a little in the hunt ourselves :)  Do we feel bad? No not at all, those little kids had no mercy.  As was announced over the mega phone, that was the fastest clean up crew Utah has ever seen.  Either way it was worth it, we got free tickets at the end to go to the baseball game across the street.  Later that day we soaked up the beautiful sun as we threw the football in the park.  It was a fun holiday full of good times.

Emily's contribution: I hate snow (most of the time). This is what it looked like Friday morning when we got up to go to classes. It is Easter weekend and snowing!! I was not a happy camper. But I was very grateful that by the end of the day it all melted so our Easter egg hunt at Deb's was still awesome without snow.

Deb's house

The football stadium filled with eggs and melted chocolate.

waiting to start...

Em got dominated. Yet again. But this time by kids.

Bright orange shirt=$2.50. Amazing find. Josh also said it was easy to find me in the crowd.

Fun in the park!

don't mess with me!!!

Em: I have actually really enjoyed playing football with Josh. I thought that I was completely awful at football and that it wasn't fun at all. But I've had a blast tossing it back and forth together. Not to mention I'm not too bad! :) Still don't really enjoy watching football though... I'm sure it'll grow on me. Eventually.

Me and my roommates all happened to be wearing blue skirts on Sunday. Presh.

God shinning down and approving of our relationship ;)

Please sir, may I have some more?

The hunt at Em's Gma's house with basically Pheonix running around trying to find all the eggs. He needed a little help. And he seemed to love these set of stairs that lead no where.