Chicken Tortilla Soup!

I love Cafe Rio Chicken tortilla soup! However I love Joni more!
Love, Dave

I love Charlie!!

I just returned home from a 5-day trip to San Francisco to meet my cute new nephew, Charlie. I was able to be there for his one-month birthday which was fun. It was so fun to live in the house with a newborn baby. He is so cute and so fun. It was funny because Mar would feed him, then let me hold him as he fell asleep and then he would wake up and it would be time to feed him again. Every time Mar would say it's time to feed him I would say, didn't you just barely feed him? It's funny how fast time flies and how often babies eat. Mar is such a good mom and it's so cute to see her taking such good care of such a sweet little guy.
While in San Francisco we drove around and saw the sights: The Golden Gate Bridge, the freezing cold beach, fisherman's wharf, Robin William's home, and downtown San Francisco. Some of the streets are so steep I don't think I would dare drive on them, but Mar had no problem, she's used to them by now. While I was there Josh had to fly to Salt Lake for his grandpa's funeral so I was able to spend some quality time with just Mar, Charlie, and my mom, but we did miss Josh.
Being with Charlie all day everyday allowed me the chance to really fall in love with him and his sweet spirit. It made me realize that I could totally handle being a mom someday. At first it seemed impossible, but as I watched how Mar handled things I realized that it is doable. Although, I wasn't the one who had to wake up every 2 hours throughout the night, I'm sure that changes everything.
I'm so thankful that I got the opportunity to meet Charlie and to spend time with Mar and my mom. I was so sad when I had to leave because I know I'm going to miss Charlie a ton. Good thing I had Dave at home waiting for me, otherwise I may never have come home.

National Boards Are Over

It's weird that I've taken the 8 hour 350 question test, it's in the past, but somehow it's still managing to ruin my life. Things would be much better right now if I knew whether or not I passed. I don't find out for at least a month, Boo!! I thought I was ready for the test, but it totally rocked my world. By the end I was so brain dead I like couldn't function. We got a lunch break after the 1st 4 hours and my brain was so fried that I couldn't remember my locker combination that I've had for 2 years. I was totally panicking because my ID and admission ticket were locked up and the test started in 5 minutes. Thank goodness for prayer. I prayed, walked up to my locker, and without even thinking managed to unlock it.
Becky Powell is so cute and so nice. She got me balloons, gum, Hawaiian flowers hair clips, a lei, and 2 cards to congratulate me on taking boards. I'm so thankful to have such a loving and thoughtful mother-in-law.
Dave wanted to make this milestone event special so he took me to the Jazz game that night. We got the VIP tickets ($425 each!! Thanks Tony!) so that means VIP parking, pregame buffet dinner, and row 1 seats(so I can really see my boys in action). Normally I love going to games, but I was still so tired and the game wasn't very exciting since they were playing the Bobcats, so I wasn't really able to fully enjoy the experience. The game had it's moments and by the end I loved being there. After that we went to the Raddison hotel downtown to stay the night. We swam and soaked in the hot tub which was fun and relaxing. The hotel pillows were awful so we didn't sleep that well and the alarm went off at 4am and we didn't sleep for a while after that. So needless to say, we don't recommend the Raddison. Never again. The next day we woke up and went to the infamous Paradise Bakery in downtown SLC. It was a huge let down. Everyone acts like it's the greatest place ever, but I would take Old Grist Mill any day over that. We then went shopping. And then it was time to go home and face reality...Yard work. I'm sad that it's that time of the year again because I'm really not a fan of working in the yard, especially because our yard needs a lot of work.
Well, this post has been pretty pessimistic, so I better end on a good note. I love my hubby!! He is so cute and works so hard to make me happy.

Boards Are Tomorrow

I can't believe I am finally to this point in my dental hygiene career. National Boards are tomorrow morning bright and early 8am. I'm feeling pretty confident, but at the same time super nervous. I've been trying to do some last minutes review/cramming and it has only stressed me out because I realize there is a ton I don't know. Hopefully no one else knows anything either, than I'll be just fine since it is graded on a curve. Celeste and I have studied our brains out for months now so I should be fine. I don't like the idea of sitting in a classroom for 8 hours with only 1 break for lunch.
Dave got a new bike today which he is super excited about. Neither of us have rode a bike in years so it was kind of fun to fulfill that old saying, "It's like riding a bike." You really never forget. Dave has been so supportive of me and my studying and for that I am very thankful. He has even helped me study for the last few days, he's so cute. I love listening to him try to pronounce all of the dental terminology that is totally foreign to him. It reminds me of how I felt when I first started in dental.
You may be wondering why I'm blogging at 10:50 the night before the biggest and most important test of my life, well, blogging has been a serious outlet for stress these last few weeks. I can blog for hours and it totally relieves all of the stress that I may be feeling. I'm really glad that blogging has really caught on because I enjoy reading other peoples blogs.

This Weeks Exciting News

Joni: I learned that the "&" sign is actually called an ampersand. I always just called it the and sign. That's just one of those serendipitous things you learn from spending too much time with your Professor.

Dave: Was asked to join the Hookers and Slicers golf league with my dad.

Joni: Received my Local Anesthetic Success Card in the mail :)

Dave: "Learned that his wife is the only thing that makes him truly happy in this life." (Direct quote)

Birthday Day!!

Today has been full of birthday parties and I'm beat!!
We put on the annual Relief Society Birthday Party which was a lot of work and no one even showed up. We had 65 girls sign up, so we planned for 70 just to be safe. I counted 25 people including both presidencies. How lame is that?! At least I've learned a valuable lesson early in life. If you can possibly attend, sign up. If you sign up, show up. It was pretty discouraging as this was our first big activity since we were put into the presidency.
After cleaning up the church I was off to help with Becky's birthday party. This week has been crazy busy with party preparations and studying for boards. Thank goodness Brittany was able to take care of most of the party details. Britt, Nick, Trin, Dan, & I spent hours setting up at Ruby River. It was worth it in the end because everything looked great. Britt had a great vision and she was able to bring it to life. The party was really fun and I think Becky had a good time. I'm so fortunate to have a mother-in-law that I actually love and appreciate. She is so great and does so much for us. Without her our yard would look pretty scary :)














When Dave was running for office in high school his mom would help him make posters. They would get old movie posters and cut and paste his picture onto the poster and change the wording. That is one of Dave's favorite memories, so Dave and Britt decided it would be fun to make posters for their mom since she always made them for him. They took forever, but in the end it was totally worth it.

New Baby Konner!!

I'm so excited that Tesha and Ty had their new baby boy Konner. I've only seen pics so far, but he is so cute and so tiny. I hope to go see him today.
Yesterday I passed both my written and clinical local anesthesia boards!! What a relief. It wasn't as bad as I expected.