Garrett family shtuff.

Most married women who blog make it a family blog. Although my blog is technically just "mine", it's basically a family blog. Jake is a fantastic creative writer so he made his own about a year ago. So when I decided to make one a few months ago I just created my own. But lets face it; all you women who have a joint blog with your husband basically write all the blogs themselves! Anyway, my point is that this is a Jake and Hannah Garrett family update on the past little while.

Jake and I bought a car almost 2 weeks ago. It is SO great to have a car we're not embarrassed of anymore! It wasn't just that... the upkeep was becoming too much. So we sold our car to Mallory and now she has a way to travel too. I don't have to pick her up every time we want to hang out! Buying a car is a lot harder than I thought. We spent a long time calculating our monthly payment, how many years we wanted the loan to last, and what we wanted our down payment to be. When it came down to it, we had to put $500 more down and our loan length was shorter than we wanted. BUT our monthly payment is about $20 cheaper than we thought and our loan interest is ridiculously low! So you win some, you lose some. The hardest part is that if you are self-employed, getting a loan is kinda difficult. The bank wanted proof of our employment in the form of a letter from our employers. I told the car accountant that I would have to get 15 different letters, because I have 15 paychecks every month! After a lot of stress we realized that we could bring in our tax information from last year and that would work too.  So now we have a blue 2006 Hyundai Elantra!

Around the same time, Jake and I realized that there was a strange $50 charge on his debit card. After looking into it more, we realized that it was a $50 donation to a bunny shelter in California! We never paid that, obviously. What a weird thing. I love bunnies, but if I am going to donate to a charity it would be for humans. So we called our bank, they cancelled his card and sent us a new one. During the time we were waiting for the new card, Jake borrowed my debit card. We just received the new card a couple days ago in the mail, but I forgot to put my debit card back in my wallet. So yesterday I went to Sam's Club to pick up a few groceries and when I got up to the checkout, I realized I didn't have my debit card. I pulled out my credit card and swiped it, but the cashier said: "Oh, we don't take VISA credit cards". All I could think was how DUMB that is! Visa is the most common card company, and a lot of people pay with credit cards. So I pulled out my old debit card (which only has about $15 on it; I don't use that bank account). I paid for the groceries with that (even though the Sam's Club total was about $40). I felt so dumb. Everyone behind me in line probably thought I was so pathetic. After I paid for the groceries, I rushed over to the university to pick Jake up from work, we headed over to our bank and pulled out $30 in cash, then ran to my old bank and put it in my account! Luckily we beat the clock and got the cash into my account in time. STRESSFUL!

As you can see, we've had some funny bad luck lately. These are only 2 examples of many. Jake and I have handled all these situations well though, I have to say. Last summer we had some really stressful stuff happen to us. It's funny how one more year of marriage together has made us closer. This time around we know each other even better, and we just work through it with ease (for the most part :) ). I wouldn't want to go through good and bad times with anyone else.

Yesterday Jake and I got our safety deposit in the mail from our old apartment. We weren't sure how much we would get back. We got the whole thing back except $50, way more than we hoped! So to celebrate, Jake and I went on a date. I know, it seems weird to make a big deal about a date when you're married. But we haven't gone out at all in a long time. So Jake said to me, while we were getting ready: "Oh hey, can I take you on a date tonight? Can I come pick you up around... right now?". I said yes, and so he walked out the front door, knocked on it, and when I opened the door he asked if my father was home so he could check what time to have me home. He is so cute!

On another note, my sister-in-law (and friend for 4 years!) Liz recently graduated. We are both pretty bored a lot of the time; graduating does that to you I guess. We've been talking about getting together so she can teach me how to get started on family history. Today we finally got together and I realized it is SO much fun! My dad's side of the family still has a lot of work to do. I'm glad I know how to kind of look around at death records and birth certificates and such.

Life is good. Exciting things are happening. My birthday is a week from today, we'll be heading down to Kaysville for Joe's graduation and then Jake's cousin is getting married the next day. I hope it will be a great summer.

My beautiful Grandma Abbott.

Well it's another night at home alone. Jake is at work. He's been working so hard lately. Thursday and Friday he worked both jobs, being gone about 12 hours.

So naturally, I get on Facebook.

My Uncle Jerry posted some beautiful pictures of my grandma.

For the first time since she passed away, I got emotional. I'm not sure where it came from. Truthfully, I wasn't close to my dad's parents. They lived in Las Vegas, and we generally made it out there almost every summer, but probably more like every summer, just for a few days or a week. My grandparents got divorced a long time ago. I'm not sure exactly when. They decided to get married again a short time after, but then got divorced once more. They had a close relationship the rest of their lives, though. When we went out to Las Vegas we didn't have to worry about the two of them being in the same room together. They were still best friends.

My Grandpa died in December 2005. My dad made a trip out to Las Vegas to take care of his mom and see how his sibling were. A few days later we got a phone call and heard that my grandma died too. It was completely unexpected. I like to think that she died of a broken heart. Even though they were not married at the time they died, they were still great friends. It's such a sad thing, to lose both of your grandparents at the same time. I immediately began to regret not knowing them better.

My Grandma was a beautiful but fierce woman. She was always so happy to see us, especially when she came to visit us and stay at our house for a few days. She would visit with us and always wanted to hear me play the violin. Then there were other times when she would get mad at us for not maintaining our rose bushes (she loved roses) or for not having coffee in the house every morning (though we kept some for her there). She was an outstanding artist. She painted beautiful pictures that I grew up looking at. Strangely enough, we ended up with 7 paintings at the time of her death, and there are 7 Abbott children in my family. I already know which one will end up in my home someday.

My Dad's family is the most fun group of people. I owe so much of who I am to my Dad, and he is who he is because of his parents and siblings. He has 2 brothers (Joe and Jerry) and one sister (ToniAnn). I have never had the opportunity to get to know Joe, though I'm sure he's a nice man. My Uncle Jerry is one of the funniest men I have ever met. I loved when my family would come to Las Vegas and get together with him, because he is so much like my dad and brothers. Seeing them together in the same room is amazing. Such a great, genuine man. My Aunt ToniAnn is possibly the biggest sweetheart I know. A huge heart. She always gave me such great compliments growing up, always made me feel good about myself.

I'm sad that I haven't seen any of them in many years. In fact, Jake has never met a single person from my Dad's family. Some day we'll make a trip out to Las Vegas and see them.

The main reason i wanted to write this post is so that I could share some pictures of my Grandma. I want to keep a record of these, for my own kids.

Sorry the pictures are so small! I don't know how to make them bigger!

My Grandma in her element. Painting.

My Grandma the way I remember her.

More painting.

She was a big fan of kissing the grandkids... something completely foreign to me. I always got anxiety when i had to kiss Grandpa on the lips too.

I think I have her smile!

My Grandma and Grandpa are on the left. Don't they look so posh?

Apparently my Grandma was a bowler? I had no idea!

So beautiful.

Love seeing pictures of them together.

That's my Dad on my Grandpa's lap!

My Grandpa was a lucky man!

My Mom with my grandparents.

Woweee! What a hottie!

This picture is just funny!

My Grandpa looks SO much like my Dad in this picture, it's crazy.

Love and miss you, Grandma.

Our New Home

Hi Everyone!

      I have been neglecting the blog the last couple of weeks... Jake and I just moved this past weekend so I was busy packing, unpacking and setting up in our new place! This is the 3rd place we have lived in our marriage... and we'll only have been married 2 years this upcoming August. I guess you could say I'm restless. I can never find the perfect place to live. Jake always teases me and says I can't be this restless when we buy our first house, because that's much more permanent!

   I loved our first, newlywed home. It was a home split into 4 apartments. We lived on the ground level and had a lovely, wide porch. I loved having my students over there to teach. The living room had beautiful large windows and a fireplace.

As much as we both loved that place, we decided to move because our teeny tiny bathroom was only accessible through our bedroom. I know that seems silly, but it always got a little weird when one of my students had to use the restroom and they had to walk through and see Jake sitting on the bed. A bit personal. So we left that place and moved.

The next place we moved had so much more room. It had two bedrooms, a bathroom big enough for us to both walk around in a little, a huge kitchen, covered parking and a bigger living room. I felt so lucky to have a bigger place, and Jake got his own office in the second room. I'm a big believer in letting men have their own space. Sometimes as wives we decorate the home with our own pretty things and forget that it is our home with our husband, not just a place that should look nice with our own things. So Jake had this whole big room to put his gnomes, his Star Wars poster, his Spongebob stuff and anything else he came across.

Once again, I became restless. I would have been happy staying here. In fact, when we moved here I was sure that we would be there long enough to convert Jake's office into a baby room someday. But we decided to move once again. There were many reasons this time. Jake had a hard time sleeping at night because it was so bright in our room at night. The street lights were always on right outside our windows. We were in a very high traffic location so it was also very loud at all hours. I often woke up from neighbors getting up at odd hours or motorcycles speeding by. Jake didn't want to make a move again unless we found something cheaper or allowed pets, and we found the place we just moved into for much cheaper.

I always like to save money where I can. Jake and I were doing fine paying for the other place, but last summer we had a real financial scare because Jake didn't start his new job for a whole month and the job I had didn't pay me until I had been working there for almost 2 months. We also want to buy a new car. We were all set to buy one until I decided not to take the job I was planning on (see about that in an earlier post). So now we are just saving a lot of money living here, it's wonderful! It is the cheapest place that we have lived, and maybe the smallest, but it feels more like home than anything else.

I really love this place.

I grew up in the country most of my life, and was used to the quiet. This place is out of the way, and so so quiet. We have a cute little backyard with a barbecue, swing bench and some steps that lead up to a scenic trail. I feel so at home. It still has two bedrooms so Jake can keep his office. I feel like we have our own home. In the other two places I felt like we were one of a million people living in the same space. Here, we are much cozier. I'm so thankful to be here.

I was feeling a little anxious about teaching here, however. I knew some of my students would wonder why we moved into a place that was a little smaller, and I didn't want to have to explain everything I just wrote here! Some of my younger students were very tactless.

"Why is your table in the living room?"

"Why is your kitchen so small?"

"Your ceiling is lower here than your other place!"

"Why would you move here?"

"Is this place bigger than your other place?"

Kids will be kids. We love them because they are honest, so we have to take the good with the bad, right? I tried to not let it get to me. This place is better in so many ways to Jake and I. 

I think we'll stay here as long as we are in Logan.