feature on tainted perfectionist

Tainted Perfectionist, my friend's awesome new blog, featured me in her weekly FridayFreeForAll. She shares weekly videos, posts recipes, crafts, and cute little stories on her blog. Check it out! Thanks for the highlight, Abby!

What's Happening Wednesday

01. Ryan just got done being sick, now I am. This hardly ever happens.
02. Bought some amazing all natural moisturizer at Whole Foods called Desert Essence. My skin's never felt better.
03. Stuff has been disappearing lately. Papers, shoes, its' really starting to drive us crazy. Apparently I need to be more organized.
04. Went out to eat twice last week, La Frontera and a great place in Bountiful. both Mexican Restaurants, my favorite food.
05. Visited Jessica and Aaron and there little baby who is so strong! He turns his body and is very wiggly.
06.  Had a great time with my parent's Sunday night watching football and playing 5 crowns.
07.  Happy Birthday to my brother-in-law Johnny!
08. We have two more birthday's in the family Sunday.
09. Really need to get my wedding ring cleaned.
10. I've almost finished off a huge jar of chocolate covered sunflower seeds we got for Christmas by myself. Lucky for me Ryan doesn't really like sweets, not lucky for my body.

What's Happening Wednesday

01. Went to two different Babies R Us last week for gifts and with my sister.
02. Told my friend about a job opening at Make-A-Wish and she got it! So happy for her.
03. I've officially started my 1/2 marathon training. Definitely been a good week for running, I'm getting that high and feeling great.
04. Went to a cousin's baby shower with my sister in her beautiful new home. She's due in a few weeks. It was great to see some of my cousins there.
05. Spent the evening holding my new nephew. Heaven.
06. Ryan's been very sick. He went to the doctor yesterday and got antibiotics. Hopefully it will help him feel better.
07. We both had to work Monday on the Holiday.
08. I had to return a book to the library before i was done reading, now I need to put it back on hold to finish.
09. Watched "sandlot" tonight for an activity with the youth. It's been a long time since I've watched it. It's still funny.
10. Have a lot of laundry to catch up on.

our new nephews

My sister had her baby on Jan 6th. Her 3rd boy. He was born shortly after midnight and we got to visit them in the hospital that night. Such a cutie and looks different from his brothers. If you want all the details and more pictures you can visit her blog.

This is him @ 8 days..

Ryan's brother had their first child, also a boy on Jan 9th. We visited them in the hospital and got to see him only hours old. We're so excited for them and their new little family.

a wooden craft

We made this cute craft in November for super saturday. I wanted to post it earlier but we gave it to our Young Women for Christmas so I had to wait.

It took us all day to paint and another day to sand. The process was kind of ridiculous. If I would've known about the time involved I would've chosen a different project.

We had to choose three different colors of paint for each board. One for the letters, one for the background and one for underneath.

The underneath layer was meant to show through after the sanding, but we found that even after we'd sanded it didn't show through. So I thought this step was a waste.

The first step was to paint it with a shine gloss to give it some texture. Once that dried we painted the under layer, the color for the words (two coats). After that dried we put the vinyl on then painted the under layer. (two coats.) Then after that dried we did the background color, in my case red and blue. (two coats)

I made one red and one blue. 

Next, we peeled off the vinyl then sanded.

I really liked the finished product. A little worn and vintage. A ton of work, but cute in the end.

save your heart!

Photo by: Yasuhide Fumoto/Getty Images

I was reading Woman's Day yesterday and came across a health article on heart disease. It gave 6 risk factors:

1) your mom or dad had a heart attack 70%-340%
2) you spend most of the day sitting down 50%-100%
3) you're overscheduled and overwhelmed 40%
4) you're tired all the time 45%
5) you had pregnancy complications 100%
6) you spend a lot of time around smokers 25%-30%

 According to the above risk factors my risk is 120%-440% a) because my dad had a heart attack and b) i spend most of the day sitting down. Also I have high cholesterol so that raises my risk 72%. It gave 6 ways to lower your risk:

1) don't smoke - never been an issue for me
2) get your daily 30 minutes of moderate-intensity activity
3) add 20 minutes of strength training at least twice a week
4) eat Mediterranean-style. Stick to a diet mostly plant-based (try to do this)
5) keep salt levels low
6) manage stress

Exercise has always been important to me. I've been active my whole life and try to exercise consistently. I must say though, after seeing my high risk that exercise takes on a whole new meaning. Doing it to lose weight, build muscle, or feel good are all great reasons, but it makes it a lot easier to do knowing I could be saving my life. The article states that 90% of women have at least one risk factor for heart disease. But many don't know it. I'm hoping this has opened your eyes and will make you keep better tabs on your heart.

Here are some helpful online tools recommended by the experts at The Heart Truth.

-estimate your heart attack risk: hp2010.nhlbihin.net/atpiii/calculator.asp
-track your family history: familyhistory.hhs.gov
-record your health stats: heart360.org
-know what you're eating: choosemyplate.gov/supertracker

What's Happening Wednesday

01. Our gym serves pizza the first Monday of each month, yea. cool.
02. We made lip gloss for our YW activity last week. It's super easy
03. I got a new nephew Friday, Owen! That makes 8. (pics to come)
04. Ryan's brother and Jessica had their baby Monday, Kyler. First grand baby on both sides of the family.
05. Church ball has started, Ryan's excited to play again.
06. I've been really bad at working out/running. Once I get started on my training schedule it will be easier.
07. Now that all my shows are back on tv, i find myself reading less and less.
08. Been participating in a January photo of the day on instagram, it's fun and i love that app. My username is teamaria416 if ya want to join along.
09. A blockbuster near us is moving and selling all their dvd's. We've gotten a ton for $5 each!
10. We have some crazy news to share soon...

What's Happening Wednesday

01. Got a Christmas card from President Bush asking for donations. Best Christmas card ever.
02. Really enjoyed going to church on Christmas. The perfect way to celebrate.
03. Tis the season for weddings. Went to two last week. It was also my sister's and parents anniversaries.
04. My first niece turned 7. It's hard to believe she's already that old. My parents will have 8 grandkids very soon.
05. Had to use the rest of my cafeteria plan before the end of the year so I bought a bunch of 1st Aid supplies. We're ready for any major injury now.
06. Been eating a bunch of junk lately, time to get back on track.
07. We're slowly building our DVD supply back up. We got a bunch for Christmas.
08. We got an air popper that I'm really excited to use.
09. Got Ryan a fun game, Split Decision, that we've played a few times.
10. Planning to run a 1/2 Marathon with my sister this summer.

2011 recap

JAN

The year started out with a bang, literally. Our pantry fell apart so we spent a day fixing it.

FEB


Joined the apple world and got iPhones


MARCH


My sister came for a visit from Virginia and Ryan spent a week at Spring Training



APRIL


I turned 25!


MAY


Started volunteering for Make-A-Wish. Went to Idaho for Alyssa's graduation.


JUNE


Girls Camp. 5 year college reunion. Brianna's graduation



JULY


My brother came to visit!


AUGUST


Ryan turned 28 and hurt his shoulder.


SEPTEMBER


Celebrated 5 years of marriage!


OCTOBER


Ryan ran the Las Vegas Ragnar


NOVEMBER


Ran our first 5k


DECEMBER


Participated in the Festival of Trees and had a great Christmas



view 2010 recap here

The Holidays

We spent 5 days over Christmas with the Everetts. We did some shopping...

played with their cute dog..

opened gifts..

played Santa..

We had a great time relaxing, eating lots of wonderful food and being with family. 

On New Year's Eve we played games until midnight with friends.

 2012 

I can't believe the new year is already here, and I'm sure this year will fly by as well.

On New Year's Day we visited my sister who is due with boy #3 anytime. My dad got a hold of my phone while we were playing games and took these pictures.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!