BEWARE

of eye infections! They're everywhere right now! I've been making tons of eye infection appointments.  I'm down in the urgent care & just checked in 3 people back to back for eye infections.  Don't touch your eyeballs folks!

xoxosteercleeear

So along with the craziness only 18 of Weston's credits transferred from BYU-I.

He took the freshman science @ BYU but it just transferred as a generel elective...

So he's signed up for a Bio. We have been mapping out all of his college time & realized we should petition his science to count for his score!  It has been approved by his advisor & we are praying it will now get passed by the 2 other people it needs to be okayed by!

Pray for us, please, that that will be passed so he can get more GEs out of the way! 

xoxolifeisSOgood!

Life Has Been Full of:

Source

for the hubster.

which means the wife is busy, too!

Wes has been a busy beaver running around doing lots of things! 

He spends his days on campus, buying books, attending class, doing homework, returning books, activating bus pass, going to tutoring & such.  He's pretty cool!

We've almost got his whole college plan scheduled out & he's only a couple years from graduation...HALLELUJAH!

He's 46% done with his bachelor's! I'm so proud of him!

His career plans have been as such:

Navy SEAL

Physical Therapist

Navy Corpsman

Lawyer

Senator

FBI-HRT Agent

Life Flight Nurse

Firefighter/Paramedic

that is the chosen career field!  Weston would have been great at any of the above, but I'm so excited for him with picking this one! I know he'll love it!  He's going to talk to some of my cousins & uncle who are firefighter/paramedics, get some tiparoos & hopefully be the best candidate for any Fire Department!  

Hello Nashville!

Source

A girl can dream, right?

xoxoxoironingoutlife

Truly wise words.

  

xoxotgif

Thanks everyone for the car insurance tips!  We've got it on State Farm right now, but we're still lookin to see what our best option is! :)

So work is going good & life is good! No complaints! We are loving life & it is beginning to slow down again now that checkouts are over & Wes' fire season is coming to a close!  He was on a fire last weekend that consisted of 9 firefighters. His squad plus another.  by Monday night 4 of the 9 had gone home. Wes came home Monday night to sleep & had to go to the fire the next day. But as the night went on he felt more and more sick! So, he had to call in. Then Tuesday night his boss called & said he didn't want Wes coming in on Wednesday because they don't want the bug spreading more! It was a good brain break & body break for Wes. Especially since his last day of work is Saturday & he starts school on Monday! He'll be a busy little beaver!  

I've been working as BYU staff as I got hired on at the BYU Student Health Center full time! Wow I'm sure excited! I love my job & coworkers! I'm loving the work & the patients! It's nice to just have work & not school to think about! It's also nice to just have one person's schooling to pay for this semester!

I have my benefits meeting next week & I'm thrilled! It's not a prestigious job or even one that requires my degree. I love my education & I love my job, so I am happy!

Oh & I didn't share with ya'll but while I was in New York the young Brinkerhoff's became debt free!!! Yay! We paid off Wes' school loans & we are completely debt free. It is miraculous. If I was extremely open I would share with ya'll our crazy financial stance during our first year of marriage. We started out poor, got poorer & through mounds & MOUNDS of blessings from the Lord have been blessed with great jobs & great job opportunities! We still have to work hard, but we have learned the blessing that having work is!  We love our jobs & are so grateful for them!  I'm also so grateful of Weston's tremendous work ethic! He works so hard to keep our family above water & to get us started on an incredible foot! We have both matured in our views about cars, homes, & other nice things :)  It's been a great learning process over the past year!

I sure love Wes & have loved this past year! He treats me so well & with so much respect! I love and respect him too! He is just the smartest, handsomest, sweetest, strongest man alive & I couldn't ask for a single thing about him to be changed!

Anyway, my family has been in town & it's been fabulous! My mom came in town because she couldn't stand the idea of Spencie leaving home. So she wanted to be here to help him move into his dorm & get all settled!  Then, my dad happened to have to come on business...wow I was so ecstatic! So, I've been working till 6 every day, of course & then at night for a few hours getting time with the fam! Spencie has been reffing every night so we've missed him & Dani has been moving into her new apartment, & doing parent conferences, so we've missed her, too! But tonight we're all getting together for the first time this week...except now Wes just got called on a fire, so this Sunday will really be our only time of all being together :) but atleast we get a few hours that day! Of course we're missing Chaser! He's so fun & I can't believe how grown up he is & starting high school...what? baby brother in high school? weird. Anyway, life is good & mom & I have had a lunch date to Zupas yesterday & today on my lunch break...wow fun! 

That's the update for now! Sorry, no pictures!

xoxoloveyouall,readers!

Car Insurance?

Who do you use for car insurance? We're wanting to drop our car insurance payments! Do you have any suggestions? For the geo we just want liability, so it'll cut our costs, but we have full coverage on the Camry.  Let me know! :) thanks!

Wow: WE SURVIVED!

That is all I can say about this week. 

This summer has been seriously unreal.  Wes & I haven't done anything summery. I have zero tanned summer skin. Seriously. No remnants of summer have shown in our lives this summer except for Weston's exremely tan face, neck & arms that show when he's hiking at work or something.  Anyways. Wes has been gone a majority of the summer. As in. Him and I have not been to our ward once together since before we went on his New Mexico tour. The last person I sat next to at church this summer in our ward here in Provo was Chase when he was visiting while Wes was in New York.  There was one Sunday when Wes & I went to President & Sister Hutching's return from their mission. But now looking back, I realize how much of a miracle that is! He has been on a fire every Sunday this summer.  It is unreal. We have hardly seen eachother. Except for when he's not on a fire & we have about 3 hours together at night before sleep. We were talking about it this week & it made me sad. Because on numerous occasions recently I have kept talking about wintertime as though we're in it right now. & getting frustrated with myself! We went to the pool together a couple times in June, but I always thought it was too cold to swim & we haven't been able to go back since. I regret that. Canoeing is something I love to do atleast once every summer, its what I loved most about growing up in TN there were so many awesome rivers to canoe in. or wade in or anything.  We haven't done that either. We've had a few barbecues with Weston's fire squad & those have been fun, but we haven't even built our grill yet. It's still sitting on our patio in it's box. We have the best of intentions for it though! Just no time! I'm looking forward to Weston starting school up next week. Which is strange to say because I know it will be stressful for him & that he'll have a full plate with 17 credit hours. But it will be nice knowing we'll atleast be able to attend church together! Well sacrament meeting before I go to nursery :)

Anyways this week has been as crazy as the best of them. We both work full 8 hr shift days. & this week Wednesday I had a 16 hour work day going from 8am to midnight that night between our two jobs & Weston, from 9 to midnight. Thursday eight to five then that night from 8:30 to midnight.  But with running & getting ready for work again  & dinner & everything there wasn't any relax time. Then Friday I took off of work at the health center. Just so we could work at Branbury.  It was move-outs. Which is the biggest day for the RAs at Branbury. We do all the cleaning checks for move-outs. These are way more intense than the monthly clean checks we do. Those take from 4-6 hours. But the move-outs we have to check every drawer every corner every cabinet. Everything. Everyone is supposed to be checked & out of their apartments by noon. Apparently the guys in our building think they're exempt to that because we had to go recheck a ton of apartments probably 5 or 6 times. I should've just failed them on our second trip back when they weren't finished. It was ridiculous & Weston & I both worked that from 10am to 7:30 pm that night. What a train wreck. Wednesday night when we had worked that 16 hr day I said to Wes "Wow, surprisingly I don't even feel that wrecked!" The next day it showed. I was having such a hard time staying awake. & I was hating being at work. It was a problem.  But Friday was pure exhaustion.  I did not even go to the bathroom until 8pm. If that tells you how dehydrated I was. I felt like death. :Anyways. so we went & did the obviously healthy thing & got a pizza brought it home. Ate it dangerously fast & watched 3/4 of a national geographic documentary & passed out. Naturally. Then we woke up Saturday. We slept in, woke up at nine & could not decide what to do with a day off.  We have not had a workless day off probably since June that one of us wasn't working, because Weston's work week (unless called on fires, which he usually was) is Tuesday through Saturday & mine is Monday-Friday. So naturally we should both have Sundays off, but he has been called to work on Sundays & Monday's pretty much all summer. Poor guy. So we had this day off & we had talked all week about what we were going to do on our day off. Go down south & go hiking. Go canoeing. Go rock climbing. Sit. Go to the pool. We couldn't decide. One thing we had noticed is that we particularly loved the third floor apartment in our stairwell. We had just done their checkouts Friday & wanted their apartment. So we asked Nina if we could switch apartments. She rearranged some people & gave us the go-ahead. So we hit the ground running, I started doing loads upstairs while Weston went to get 2x4s to rig up something him & my dad planned up to get the piano upstairs. He got back & helped me do some loads upstairs. I had just done a few loads & was struggling with optimism.  This isn't something I generally struggle with, but I just felt like I'd been beaten with a bag of potatoes.  Weston still really wanted to move upstairs. As did I, minus the moving part. haha but anyways so I just was about dissolved to tears & asked Wes if it was really worth it. We probably talked for a half hour deciding what we wanted to do. We decided to stay downstairs in our apartment with the bugs. & the footsteps above us. & where the piano is already happily sitting.

 (we went to Ikea & got the stuff we needed & did a deep gutting of our apartment, so we're more pleased with the space we have & we switched out our blinds, so now our windows are covered reeeeeally well!)

I had a sore throat & have decided that I think I was sick yesterday from pure exhaustion, because I could feel  my sore throat throughout the day & when we were trying to decide what to do Wes asked me if we wanted to go canoeing (it was already 3pm by this point) I told him I was too exhausted. But we couldn't even relax in our apartment because there are boxes piled everywhere from everything we boxed up to move upstairs. So he came up with the most brilliant plan. We went and bought lunch out (our whole kitchen had boxes on every corner & on the floor. I was too tired to put them away) & we took our books to the park. We ate our Arby's at the park (I know, we're on a health streak) & read. & I napped. But Wes is finishing up Hunger Games & I am half way through the book "Heaven Is For Real." Really good book, but I'm not such a huge fan of how it's written. The dad gives such intense detail & it just feels kind of fluffy. Not much content for how many words it is. But it's a quick read, I read half the book between Friday night & our trip to the park.  Anyways, then we went up to Ikea & found some great organizational items. & heart-shaped ice trays. Bahah. Then came back home and it was about 10 when we got home. Cereal for dinner & then hit the bed.  It ended up being a REALLY great day with Weston. It was so nice to spend uninterrupted time together. I even got him to have his phone on silent. Because he had been off work for Branbury, he couldn't be called to a fire, anyway, so I was the only thing that had his attention. It was wonderful. We left our phones at home all day.

However. Now it is Sunday morning & Wes is on a fire & I am sitting in bed at 6:15 wide a wake & still feeling like a semi has rolled over me a few times. While our apartment is all in boxes around me. My visiting teachers are supposed to come today. I don't want to have to unpack everything. I'm staring at it & hoping that all the items will come to life & scurry to their spots. Especially in the kitchen!

xoxomybodyhurts

Weston told me I couldn't actually feel like a train wreck because I am not a machine. Whoops, I get confused sometimes.

I just completed the Hunger Games series!

Taxed & Taxed Again!

My dad did our taxes for us last weekend (Thanks Pops!!).  & I OWED the government $86....how does that work out? Super sucky!

but anyways.  Today is going to be a long one. a 16 hour work day!

8am-5pm MTC health clinic

5-6pm: four apartment checkout appointments

6pm-11:30/12: Branbury meeting & then office shift

I'm a wittle tired & extremely crampy.  Today's not lookin too bright as of right now.  Boy oh boy.  I keep saying it but I'm doubting it will ever happen. I can't wait till life slows down & I don't have so much to do all the time!

Love you all & hope you're doing well!

Remember that time I left my movie in the Redbox??

yeah... that was embarrassing...

Well I outdid myself. Except this one cost a lot more money!

2 weeks ago Wes was on a fire & I was on my way to church.  Only to stop at the ATM to pull out 3 paychecks worth of tithing. Yes. 3.  I did the transaction the money came out, I just wanted to be sure I did everything right so before I forgot I needed to text Wes & tell him about the transaction. So, as I was texting him. It sucked the money right back into the machine! UH...I started clawing at the little metal door to give me my money! Ah. I freaked out. I called the customer service line on the atm. It was closed till business hours. Peachy! So, I drove around the block (there was a long line of suited men & dressy women in sudans behind me.  I drove around the block & went back up to the atm. Trying to withdraw it again just so I could actually get it in that day. Nope. wouldn't let me withdraw money. What the heck. Anyway. So I am late to church & since I didn't have to teach nursery that Sunday I ran home after the first hour & made looots of phone calls.  Finally got through their automated system to talk to a lady & to find out what to do. Basically she said the refund would take 10 business days.  I still have 3 more business days to wait.  I didn't even know atm's sucked the money back in. & wouldn't the machine know it was sucking it all in? Then why did it still charge me? ugh I was so frustrated with myself! So, anyway, it's still a little raw & I haven't quite started laughing at myself hysterically yet, only partiallly.  Until the moolah is refunded to our account I won't be able to stop thinking about it! Just thought I'd share.  Hope you enjoyed.

Life lesson: TAKE YO MONEY!

xoxothankyouatm

Just plain rude!

My favorite food.

Pumpkin anything.

Especially with Chocolate Chips.

These foods sneak their way out of cupboards and ovens around Thanksgiving and Christmas mostly.  However. I have been on a sugar fast for about a month. (haven't seen any results yet. ugh) & it's definitely summer time.  Yet I have been tortured, I can promise you.  Pumpkin chocolate chip treats have snuck their way in front of me TWICE in the past two weeks.  What are the odds? I'm not sure either, but it's cruel.

At the MTC we have a staff meeting once a month on Friday mornings.  2 weeks ago someone brought pumpkin chocolate chip bread for their contribution to the potluck breakfast.  Then when I picked Weston up from work Saturday night to drive down to Fishlake Bret, Wes' coworker, offered me pumpkin chocolate chip cookies.  He acted all offended that I didn't take one. Which is even worse, because I hate offending people.  BUT I stayed strong.  Now only if I can see some results I might start to call this sugar fast worth it. We'll see!

BTW Nursery was a warzone yesterday.

seven 3 yr olds: 1 

Three twenty-two yr olds: 0

xoxoscaredforprimaryprogram

Monkey Business

Wes is extremely obsessed with silver back gorillas.  We watch gorilla shows all the time. He wants a cave in our house that has gorillas in it.

Tonight he said "I don't want a gorilla anymore..."

& then showed me this article.

hahahaha

but seriously.Yikes. Poor woman.

xoxooohoohoohahaaaaah

 Spencie & I ventured across the country. from NYC to TN....then TN to Utah. A very. very. long drive.

 But we had a fun drive & were so happy when we made it!  I forgot how deserty it is here!

holaaa

NTB The Work Album Release Concert

 Cute boy & beautiful weather!

 Sun was going down before the show started!

 I love those dimples!!

After that the camera was put in my purse. Under my chair.  In a trash bag from the concession stand.  That's right.  It DOWNPOURED most of the concert.  Luckily it stopped a little after the intermission & just sprinkled off & on after that. So we sat there, shivering, wet & so incredibly happy to be there!

Basically, that's why the camera was put away until the end of the show!

 The show was great w/ tons of big names in it...but my favorite.  Billy Dean. Golly I love his music.

 They've outdone themselves once again.  The incredible Nashville Tribute Band!

Jason & me!

 My hair dried miraculously. I should start styling my hair with rain more often.

 Wes & Jason!

Wes' shoulder is still soaked from the rain!

look on their website Nashvilletribute.com and check out their tour series & find a location near you. You will NEVER regret going to one of their shows! One thing that made me a teency bit sad about the album opener is Jason didn't talk as much as he normally does. If you've never met him, Jason is hilarious, witty & extremely off color. I love it.

It was the perfect personality combo for an early mornin seminary teacher!

xoxomusicaesmifavorita

Speaking of being gone...

Wes has been on another fire since Friday.  I went to work & that's the last I saw of my cute husband!  I got this picture though....

There was another bigger fire that they were worried about so they pulled Wes from the fire he was on & put him on the new fire.

Fire number one was on Lake Mountain about an hour from Provo.  The new one that he started on yesterday afternoon is by Eagle Mountain.  He sent me this picture when he was moving from fire #1 to fire #2.  Poor guy.  He sent me another picture this mornin on their way to the fire from camp & he looked as cute as ever and a lot more rested than he was in this picture!  He's so handsome, even covered in ash.  He looks exhausted! Whew, I don't know how he does that job!

I sure missed him!

 Weston was gone pretty much all the days leading up to me going to New York.  He even missed a fire the day before because he had a doctor's appointment.  Lucky for me, because we got to actually have some time together before I left for a week!  Whenever we're apart it's always a sweet reunion! 

The night I got home we had the nicest dinner that Wes made & then we went & saw the movie 17 Miracles.  Wow, I needed a box of tissues, I swear!

I sure love him & love having him around! I was so surprised & excited he had the whole apartment cleaned from top to bottom when I got home! 

It was a sweet reunion! I don't like being away from him!

New Yawk!

 Me & the darling flat Stanley Weston.

An unbelievably enormous Forever 21.

4 stories. Escalators & all.

 Our hotel was right on Times Square.  We walked outside to this every morning...

 We went to church downtown!

The Manhattan Temple & the church are right inside the end of that building! Can you spot Maroni?

She's a little scared of heights & we were 29 floors up!

 The new local.  She's a subway pro!

 Waiting in line for ferry tickets

 I feel like I got the whole experience. We parked the car Saturday night & didn't get back into it until Friday morning when we were leaving town, took the subway everywhere!

 This subway system is so efficient...me gusta!

 seester, mom & brudder

 Reppin my religion

 I've got to admit, they get a bad wrap, but I felt safest in the taxis. As they were swerving between cars & humans....

 nothing quite like a Johnny Depp Lego man!  I hope that's not life size because he'd be a teency man...

 neato

 Me & Spencie

  more subway adventures. Hi, sir sitting back there.

 Don't mind my mom, she thinks the monuments are more important to focus in on than the daughter.

It's true.

 Lady liberty

 Cool WW(I or II) monument in the river off to the side of the ferry line.

 Thanks, Frenchies!

 Ferry

 Thank you, sir, for stealing my innocence.

Ask Dani if you want to hear a hilarious story of this picture. Consisting of a lense cap & him playing "whose butt is that?" with his own portrait.

 I was pretty infatuated with this city.

 Ellis Island Grand Hall!

 The Ellis Island building where all the immigrants came through!  12 million people came through in those 50 yrs! It was a lot quicker of a process than I thought, though! Some immigrants would be onto New York City that night! Others it would take a couple weeks!

 My public health nerdiness came out in this picture.  I loved their processing. They'd write with chalk on everyone's lapel about what health condition they were in. So they could quarantine as needed.

 Some people that had to go through the hearing process to defend their ability to add to society & to be a safe & beneficial citizen.

 "I love America!"

 The subway stop for the World Trade Center.

Spencie & Momma had been talkin all mornin & plannin our subway route w/ all our train hopping.  Finally I couldn't take it anymore and said "EW, okay, can we stop using that word?  It's really gross."

Reminds me of another very similar word.

 Right next to the WTC's.  This is the World Financial Center.

My dad's company he worked for for the past 10 years is in this building....pretty unreal.

one of the new WTC

 Ground zero! this is the only glimpse of it we could find around the whole property! the property is 16 acres & was all fenced off for construction of the 4 new world trade centers & then the memorial pools that are being constructed in the footprints of the wtc.

 Momma & the boys have been to the WTC memorial, so just Dani & I went.

This  is a picture from a cell phone that someone took of all the people walking down the stairwells while the firefighters were hiking up.  This was taken on the 40th floor.

They didn't say, but I doubt those firefighters didn't make it out.

 The whole memorial was really neat.  They had this big pillar looking things set up that were labeled north or south tower & they & had the time on it. They were in chronological order.  They had quotes & pictures all over them... It was incredible.

 Amazing Bronze murals plastered on the outside of the fire station right next to the WTCs

 A plane window...

 Cousin It & Chase

 Me inside the WTC Memorial Gallery (the actual museum won't be completed until September 2012 & it is being built on Ground Zero)

 More of that same mural

 This makes me tear up everytime I reread it.  This little boy had been visiting his dad at work that day.  They didn't mention the boy's fate.

 victims

 debris

 Actual "Missing" signs posted around NYC.

 A little tribute of those that fell from FDNY right outside the fire station.

Patch.

 heartbreaking

 There was lots of artwork from kids all over.  Center bottom row yellow tile is from Memphis.  HOLLER.

 The names of those killed & some more kids artwork.

 This is only part of two of the walls that had those that died plastered all over them.  It was so sad to look at. I couldn't look at that wall for very long.  There was a completely different wall just for Fire fighters.

 What the 4 new buildings will look like.  One World Trade Center is 1776 ft tall. Symbolizing the year our country gained independence.

 They had these cards there that people could fill out to be used in the museum.  They had them hanging along the walls in the basement of the memorial.

 I wrote one to the extent of how those firefighters were all heroes. How they all became saviors that day. They gave their life so that others could live.  I talked about their families.  The ones they left behind. I wrote about how I can't imagine if Wes was a fire fighter in NYC that day.  How I know he would have been there right next to his fire fighter brothers. He would call me from the phone & tell me there's been an attack and that he's responding to the emergency. He would tell me he loves me.  He would tell me he's okay.  I can't imagine how those wives feel that lost their husband's that day.  Or the kids that lost their dads. All because of one evil man's plan.

 We saw on the news that night that someone had attempted to hijack a subway...bahah we didn't notice!

 

 brother bears!

 Me & Deej waiting for mom outside of the Memphis show!

 Not that I'm a connoisseur, but this is the best broadway EVER!

 Waiting for Memphis to begin!

Too bad I won't be able to sing this soundtrack with the windows down, it has the "N" word in it.

 Brothers

 NYPD

 Walking advertisements!

Free Jordin Sparks concert in Times Square!

 Where did Weston visit?

New York was SO much fun! My mom took Danielle & I to Phantom of the Opera, Memphis & the whole family to The Addams Family.  All on Broadway. & all amazing.  Seriously.  I was in love.  I have never seen so many bright lights.  On Times Square it seriously looked as though the sun never sank below the buildings.  I saw hardly any trees, except for in the parks & suburbs.  We got to see Ground Zero,  The Statue of Liberty, and Ellis Island.  Three things I have always wanted to see!  The people there were as cold as they can get. It's just like the movies. Hustle & bustle all the time! I couldn't believe how busy that place was.  The first night my dad picked me up from the airport & we were slammed in bumper to bumper traffic downtown I just about had a panic attack. When I made it up to the hotel room I told my whole family I could stay in the hotel for the rest of the week and be A-Okay! There were so many people, so much camotion, it was so loud.  I thought I was going to freak out.  But I went out in it every day & my first day out there was a little stressful, but after that I was totally fine!  It was fun! I kind of felt cool walking like I knew where I was going!  It was the greatest vacation.  I missed Weston so so badly.  He can't be more than 2 hrs from Spanish Fork because he is on call 24/7 for fires.  So he was stuck in Poohtah.  But, we he was an angel about it & genuinely wanted me to go on that trip.  Plus I brought him home some goodies, so we all made out even, right? :)  My phone didn't work the whole week, so all I could do was answer his calls at night. It took me 30 minutes (no exaggeration) to type a 5 word text to him.  It was crazy frustrating being so far from him & so without communication.  I can't imagine not being able to talk to him for 10 minutes every night!  I don't know who would've died first, him or me! I found that he forgot how to eat vegetables while I was gone, so I reminded him every day "don't forget some healthy stuff with your dinner" hahah but he was a happy man eating his frozen burritos...I know it.... He was so excited for me to cook again when I got home! hahah  I was sad the WHOLE family didn't get to be together.  But it was nice to be able to spend time w/ my parents & brothers that I usually get to see just twice a year.  This year, luckily Dani & I graduated & I got this little New York trip, so that we got to see each other more.  But I probalby won't see them again until next april or summer sometime.  Tear :(   Last Christmas was our last Christmas all together until Christmas 2014 when Spencie gets back from his mission! That's depressing.  4 years between Christmases when we're all together!  I sure love my family & all the time we had to be able to relax & kick back...minus dad....The only thing he got to do with us was go to Addams Family! But we did get to eat together every night! He was up and out of the hotel room & to work which was a block away at 6AM & didn't get home till 7 or 8 at night...he is one hard working man!  Thanks for working so hard so that you've got such a great job & thanks for traveling every week for your work so we get to drive with you & stay in your hotel room, too! The pull out couch was perfect! :)  I love you!!

xoxothebigapple!