Our newest family addition

Okay so matt and I have not had any children, because we are not like a vast majority of people who for some reason having children comes so easily too.  Wanted to fill that void with none other than a puppy.  One friday during work matt was talking to a co-worker, DeAnn, who mentioned that she was getting a puppy and that they had one more left from the litter.  We jumped on the opportunity and called the lady and planned to travel to Tuscon to see the puppy before making our final decision.  On saturday we saw her and fell in love.  Not realizing the energy a Jack Russell Terrier offered we took her home with us.  Even though she has a lot of energy she has brought so much joy to our lives.  Here is our beautiful little girl.

Getting ready to jump up

 Our neighbor has labs and one day decided to give trix one of their raw hyde bones

 She enjoys it just as much as the little raw hyde bones we give her

So I put her outside before I go to work and it is like 40 degrees out so we bought her a little jacket

I took her for the first time to the vet yesterday and she was such a good girl.  She saw a cat for the first time and growled at it and it made me laugh.  She met other little puppy friends too.  It was so cute.  Even though she is not a human child she will fill that spot and prepare us for someday having children of our own.

Our New House #1

Okay so after a long time not posting here it is.  Matt and I put and offer in on a house on July 23rd knowing that it was a short sale and could take up to six months to get through everthing.  Well, truth is we could have gotten in sooner if the bank hadn't sold the loan the same week we put the offer in.  Anyways,  our lease for our rental ran out Nov. 1st and of course the final paperwork had not been filled out to officially move in.  So matt and I stayed with a girl from my work and her husband, Jade and Ryan.  We are VERY grateful for them opening their home to us.  So we signed the papers on Nov. 9 and funded on the 10th and now we are officially first-time homeowners.  We are so incredibly happy that we have a place to settle into since being in college and moving around SO much. 

Since we have been in a period of transition for many months we have not had internet and unable to update our blog with our life stories. So I was able to take some pictures of our home before moving in and those are the ones I will show. Here they are:

The Entry Way

Formal Living Room 

 Formal Dining Room

 Family Room

 Another angle of Family Room

 Kitchen (right off of Family Room)

 Other view of Kitchen

 Laundry Room (Right off Kitchen, entry to garage through Laundry Room)

 Hallway off of Family Room

 Hall Bathroom

 The left bedroom off of Hallway (didn't get a picture of the other one)

 Master Bedroom

Master Bathroom

 Master Closet

 Master Bath coutertops

 Walk-in Shower and Garden Tub (not jetted sadly)

 Our Home

It's official

Great News!! It is offcial as of September 16th  Matt and I have become official Arizona residents.  I feel like I can start making a life for myself here instead of being in transit every six months.  It is crazy though to be a resident somewhere else other than Utah.  I wonder how long we will live her anyways.  Matt still needs to get his master's in finance and MBA and who knows where we will end up for that schooling.

Sorry for not updating the blog.  I really am not that into it now that I have started working full time.   I just have so many other things on my mind.  A lot has happened.  Matt and I put an offer in on a house about two months ago and still have not heard back yet (it is a short sale and the bank is being really slow).  This is a little sad because Matt's sister and brother-in-law who we currently live with have bought a house and we will officially need a place to stay by Nov. 1st.  Anyways that is what has been taking up a lot of my free time. 

With my job I am slowly starting to enjoy what I do; because I would perferably like to do something related to my education.  At my job I do multiple things.  I handle collections on past due patient accounts, sometimes fill in for the front desk, balance the insurance checks and other miscellaneous projects.  I know it is has a little to do with my accounting degree, but it is something to make money so that matt and I can save money to either buy a car or other things that are on our to buy list. 

Anyways life is pretty crazy, but Matt and I have made an effort so see some of the surrounding attractions.  Like in Pheonix (3 hours away), we spent a weekend there and Tuscon (2 hours away).  We even made a trip out to San Diego which is about a 7 1/2 hour drive (not to bad).  I has been fun living in the desert and seeing all the different plant life and the monsoon season,  which is sooooo cool,  I love the rain storms here that are really intense.  I will keep you updated on our house, because we will get it. 

We are here

So matt landed a job with a company called EuroFresh down near Wilcox, AZ as a staff accountant. Matt went down to start working shortly after accepting the offer leaving me for two weeks living with my parents so that he could find a place for us to live. During those two weeks my brother Mitch and his wife Lindsey came and visited us from Kentucky. I was able to see my little niece Makenzie, who I have not seen since our wedding last year. She has grown so much and has an adorable personality.

I would play with my lips making noises and she would copy

You would point your finger at her and she would touch her pointer finger to yours it was so cute.  She pulled away before I got a good shot.

Matt came back a couple days before memorial day weekend and had a chance to play with Mitch, Lindsey and Makenzie before packed up all of our stuff and moved to the AZ.  We moved to a little town called Safford to a studio apartment that is above his sister and brother-in-laws house.  Here are a couple of the pictures of our studio apartment.  Please don't mind the mess we have more stuff than will fit in the apartment. 

  

  

 

We have a cool stained glass window in the apartment.

On top of the house there is this little patio and these are the only stairs leading there.

 

The view from the deck to the front yard.

So the weather here is actually not that bad and the city is small, but has potential to feel like home.  I do need to admit that I am a little sad that the nearest big city is two hours away (matt and I made it in one and a half hours though) that town being Tuscon, Pheonix is three our so hours away.  The town does have a Walmart, Safeway, and Home Depot and a movie theatre that plays current movies.  Matt and I are currently looking for a house to buy so that we can officially live in a place of our own and not live with family.  Anyways,  I look forward to keeping you all up to date on our future adventures here.

New Job in Arizona

Okay so a lot has happened and if I told you everything it could get pretty long.  To shorten things up we got back from Mexico April 14th, just in time to enjoy the cold rainy weather.  Matt went into high gear to find a job, luckily matt has the best brother-in-law Ben who told him about an opening at the company he works with in Arizona.  Matt was flown down for an interview and he got the job. YEAH!!!! (a little nervous to live in rural arizona).  We will be moving to the Thatche/Safford area.  We will now get a pay check and that is better than no money at all.  Now we are in the process of getting things together and moving.  Matt starts his job on monday the 17th and I will stay in town until Memorial Day when we will move our stuff down.  This is in consideration that matt will be able to find a place to live if not we might be living in a hotel for a period of time.  I am hopeful though that we will get a place soon.  There is only two of us right? 

Well, this was a quick catch up and I will keep you all updated on the changes in our life.  I am sure there will be many new adventures to come within the coming months. 

Lately

Sorry for not keeping up with this, but I just have forgotten about it.  Anyways two weekend ago we went to a suburb of Guadalajara known as Tlaquepaque.  We went to their main square where there was a cathedral and like Guadalajara they had a entire street dedicated to pedestrians.  Here is where a lot of the shops were.  There was an area with a bunch of art.  The art ranged from all pweter to clay statues of mayan gods and pots to hand made dinnerware.  It was really fun to see all of the different artwork I definitly would have bought something, but money is not in surplus these days.  Along this street there were locals making these beaded bracelets, necklaces, earrings, rings, bead glued onto wooden animals (turtles, tigers, donkeys, etc.).  It was really fun to see.  Also along the street were a large number of restaurants..  One had a huge chair outside of it that was fun to sit on.  We came across a mariachi band playing for some tables dressed in native clothing.  All in all our trip was fun and successful especially when we got on the wrong bus to take us back home we ended up clear in norther Zapopan instead of at the south end, where we live. We took a taxi and loved the driver he was a fun guy to talk too.  Matt and him chatted about sports the entire way home. 

I would put pictures up, but the pictures we got were on the actual camara and not taken with the memory card and we don't have the attachments with us.  It was good times though.

Guachimontones

Okay so I have been bad about updating this. 

So when Matt and I found out that there were ruins not to far from Guadalajara we were real excited.  They are not Mayan or Aztec ruins.  Archeologists don't really know who the peole were so they named the ruins after the tribe that was prominant in the area. 

So our journey getting there was fun.  We went to the bus station and bought a round-trip ticket to a small little town called Teuchitlan. This town is in rural Mexico for sure.  On our way there were sugar cain fields all around us so cool (they look a little like corn fields).  So all of the sudden the bus pulled off into this small little town and I didn't see the sign so I had no idea where we were, we didn't get off.  Pulling out of the town we realized that we were supposed to get off, that was our stop.  Luckily there were some people that got off like a mile down the road, yes we walked that mile back (lucky it was not that far). 

When we got back to the town we had no idea where to go so we started walking and about two blocks we saw a sign pointing the direction of the ruins.  Before going we decided to eat some food at a little taco stand (my first time doing that since we have been here, I am not big fan of mexican food, it was good though).  So we started following the signs through the town.  There were a lot of water parks on the way we should've taken pictures. 

This is a picture of the streets we walked through town (aprox. 1 mile in town)

The street going up to the ruins it was uphill like this for about a three-forths of  a mile

We made it to the top of the hill, oh wait no we didn't (We should've taken pictures of the last uphill stretch to the ruins)

Okay after the tough walk up the hill we were a little exhausted and what we first saw we did not think was very impressive, but then we went closer to the ruins. They were bigger than at a distant.  Look they are circular though and not like the Mayan or Aztec ruins.

We then started to walk around, this place was huge.  This was a smaller pyramid.  Something we noticed (we didn't have a guide) was that around these circular pyramids was a circle walkway with platforms evenly space around the center pyramid.  We kept on walking around and found about four similar set-ups within this area (later we looked at an information sign they had and there were five we missed one of them).  Anyways there was one that looked like they didn't uncover all the way, but we could hike to the top (we were not allowed to get on the other ones).  Up there you could hear peole really well from wherever you stood in the area.  Really cool.  The next picture is from the top of the hill thing looking out at the most impressive pyramids.

This is a picture of one of the ruins that was on the other side of the hill thing.

These ruins were discovered back in the early 1980's when some archeologists were visiting the area and sitting in a nearby hot spring when they found an artifact made out of obsidian.  They were curious as to where it came from so they hiked the hills above the hot spring and climbed up a hill and told themselves "this hill is not natural" it was from then that these archelogists decided to dedicate their lives to uncover these ruins.  They found that they were nothing like the mayans or aztec so they named them after the local tribe.  This people controlled a large area.  They owned one of the largest obsidian mines in the area. When we were there we didn't get to see any artifacts because the visitor center is not open yet.  These ruins became open to the public 2005.  The following picture is of the area that they are still uncovering for anything else.

This is the view from the Ruins.  You can see the little town and the lake all the way across the valley.  What a great location these people had.

This is the view on our walk down from the ruins.  You can see the town a little better.

All and all this was really interesting and fun to see.  I reccommend if any goes to this area to see these ruins.  They are an hour (hour and half by bus) west out of Guadalajara and probaby about two and half hours east of Puerta Vallarta. 

Downtown Guadalajara

Well I guess it's my turn to update the blog. I've been seriously ill all week with something in the spectrum of a stomach infection, salmonella poisoning, or some stomach virus and along with me it seems to have taken a toll on Nikki. I guess our little ventures out of the house when I get home from work are what keep her going. She's had a hard time being cooped up with sicky me all week. Luckily she is still in good health. Unfortunately, 6 days later, and about 10 lbs lighter and I'm still not feeling a whole lot better. We are hoping that it is just running it's course but if I'm not better by Monday I think I may have to bite the bullet and go see a doctor.
Also unfortunate is that this illness seems to have stemmed from a great weekend we had last weekend. The week before Valentine's day we took a day trip to the historic city center and had a lot of fun going through and athropological muesem for the region, seeing all the old building and wandering through this enormous market. We decided that for V-day we would get a hotel downtown and spend a couple of nights down there. We stayed at the Hotel de Mendoza(which unfortunately we didn't really get an pictures of) and it was nice. It has a great location right in the middle of the all the downtown plazas and mixed in with many of the beautiful historic buildings.

Nikki really liked taking pictures with these weird benches, chairs and sculptures.

She got a real kick out my pose for this one.

This was the Huge market. all the shops were just jam packed together and probably only 10 to 15 ft per shop one right after another. You could buy anything there from food to clothes to eletronicsto pirated dvds. We picked up a jersey for the local soccer team. It was 3 floors and easily covered 2 to 3 city blocks.

We stayed around the area on Friday night and found out that it was the 468 anniversary of the founding of Guadalajara. That's a lot of years! And the city was hosting some shows in the plazas right across the street from our hotel. So after some McDonald's for dinner(Nikki gets cravings for American cuisine) We walked around the plazas and stopping to listen for a moment and snap some pictures.

This was the roof our hotel above and below is the plaza across the street.

The Federal Palace on one side.

And the Degollado Theater on the other end.

And here's Nikki by the fountain on the front side of the Cathedral.

 

On Saturday we woke up and went to find something to eat. Then we set about trying to figure out what we were going to do for the day. We finally decided in visiting a park that Nikki had read about online in a north-western suburb called Zapopan. It was a fun park with a lot of interesting things to see. They had a beautiful Japonese garden that was populare for special event pictures.

Some pictures of the Japanese garden.

We got a kick out of these turtles.

NIkki and I in the cactus garden.

After kind of a long day of walking we were glad to get back to the hotel and rest. We finally went out to find something to eat and then walk around a little bit more downtown. Sunday we woke up and had breakfast at the hotel(which I think may have been the cause of my stomach troubles) then grabbed our stuff and headed home. We have an enjoyable weekend and found a few other things that we would like to do soon.

Here is the view of the catheral and Nikki on the hotel roof.

Nikki was really hoping we would be able to go out today but I'm still not feeling really well and I end up pretty out of breath and light headed after just a few blocks of walking. I'm afraid I'm really going to have to work hard to make up for this one.