Im getting married in the morning.....in 13 days!!!!



BAHAHAH I AM GETTING MARRIED!!! I am going crazy if that was the next question to cross your mind. Apparently it is impossible to find married housing at a reasonable price in the middle of November, geeze. Oh well if Seth and I end up living in a box, ....wait I dont know how I feel about that.
Besides the minor details of finding a house....minor minor if i keep repeating that to myself then it will be minor....anyways besides that detail, this last weekend Seth and I did bridals and grooms. Bridals and Grooms for those outside of Utah culture are Bridals with the groom there...in the pictures. So here are some of my favorite. Thanks to Jaime and Matt (Seth's brother) I am able to proudly display my first and only bridals.
So we will start with Kissy pictures first:




Okay I am sick of trying to figure out how to post pictures. Enjoy!

So I know I have a TON to blog about but here I go. So school has been really good lately! I have enjoyed my classes work has also been good......but I guess everyone doesn't really want to hear about that. Okay fine IM ENGAGED! I am going to marry my love Seth aka Sethie poo lover boy according to freshman year. I am sooooo excited! Yet at the same time overwhelmed with trying to get everything done. My schedule has never seemed so busy. I start off going to school at 7:30 every morning with dad. Then class and just before I go to work, I have a wonderful hour break and occasionally I see Seth. After work I either stay at school with Seth and study until 9 at night or go home with dad. So any extra time I can find in the day I try to plan things for the wedding...geesh, things are too time consuming. Now I know why people hire wedding planners.

BUT this is the plan for now. I am getting married November 24th in the Provo Temple!!!!
Now you probably want to hear the engagement story....well, it is really long....lovely but long. So here it goes.

We started out going straight to dinner right out of work. He surprised me by taking me to Chef's table. Which is an awesome place! I felt like royalty from the moment we walked in. We sat in a nice booth both facing out of the window. Guess what was clearly visible through the window????? The Provo temple, so in my mind I thought, YAY he is going to propose tonight. (well I guess I better start earlier than dinner...the night before I had Cindy help do my nails, so they would look good with the ring. I also told both of my parents that I was going to probably come back engaged...I know a little over-presumptuous) We had a wonderful dinner, I was a little nervous because chef's table was a really really nice place. I didn't think I fit in very well. We went through salad, dinner, and dessert without me seeing any signs of a ring in sight.
We ended up leaving without even saying anything about a ring.

When we got in the car he said "so where to you want to go now" that translated to me as "I dont know what to do next, I am not proposing to you tonight." I know, it was a harsh reality for me too. I said I didn't really care, I suggested his mountain, which is his mountain. Instead we went up Provo canyon towards Bridal Veil falls.

Upon reaching the parking lot of Bridal Veil Seth turns to me and says "do you want to see something terrible?" which translated in my head as "we are not really doing anything romantic up here I just wanted to come up here." He parks the car but doesn't turn it off so I assume we really are just going to see something terrible and then leave. So he gets out and heads to a boulder marking the parking stall and starts picking at it. After a while he starts pulling white car paint off of the boulder and tells me this was where he backed his car into earlier today. I felt so bad for him, poor kid, running into rocks! So I said sorry, but then he just kept staring at it and peeling at it. In my head I am thinking 'what is wrong with this kid.' In his head he was thinking, 'what am I going to do know?' Apparently a few engagement plans had fallen through right before dinner and during dinner. In my head, it didn't even translate. So I stood their shivering waiting for him to stop mourning his loss.

After the terrible spot we got back in the car and start driving out of the canyon. At this point I am still pretty full and starting to fall asleep because I was sooo full! So I told Seth I was going to take a quick nap while he decided where we wanted to go next. I wake up maybe five minutes later thinking oh we are probably at a park, that's romantic. I sit up and we are in a residential area. Seth came and opened my door (like he always does, such a good boyfriend) and I ask what this place was. He said it was his aunts house, an aunt I had never met before. Instead of heading for the front door he starts walking to the back. I start asking why we dont just go to the door and introduce me to them and then go in the back, that way I wouldn't feel like I was hanging out in a strangers backyard. However, that awkwardness did not seem to phase him.
He continued to pull me towards the backyard when the thought came to me....hmm maybe something is happening? We turned the corner and there was nothing there. Nothing but darkness.

For some reason this did not deter Seth. We continued to walk and get to a garden portion of the yard, but it was dark, so Seth explained that this was a flower garden. And then I could tell that it was a very beautiful flower garden (similar to Thanksgiving pointe gardens) One part of the garden had a little garden table with two chairs so we sat at the table and just talked. Not about anything in particular, in fact I cannot even remember what we were talking about.

By this point I was so confused. I was a little upset because I thought for sure it was going to happen, but it HADN'T. Yet I was happy because I love him. I also vaguely remember feeling a little sad that some sort of conflict was going on in his mind, but he wasn't telling me.
All of those feelings came to me while sitting at that little garden table. But were soon forgotten when the bushes/flowers next to us started shaking. For some reason I thought people were rushing toward us, so I screamed, really loud in fact. Don't worry though because it was only the SPRINKLERS....gah. Seth and I moved to a portion of the garden where the water wasn't hitting and he just held me tight and started telling me about the ring. And how it wasn't going to be here for another week...."but then," he said, "my uncle called yesterday and said it was ready" He got down on one knee and proposed!!!! Ha so cute! The funny part was that he was holding my right hand when he asked so instead of giving him an answer I said, "wrong hand." HAHAH, his response was "you have to say yes or no before I put it on."

Well I said yes and then we went back to his car (after running through the sprinklers of course). In the car we turned on the light and I got to see my ring for the first time! Seth surprised me with a gorgeous Halo set diamond ring with smaller diamonds lining the side. SOOO beautiful, I couldnt stop saying 'wow' for like an hour.

So that is our story, of course it had to be a long and terribly depressing story but know that Seth is normally very very romantic. We hope to be able to laugh about this forever. Hope you enjoyed it!
ps that is the night he proposed.

My Manassa Marathon Man!
The trip to Manassa was a looooong 9-10 hours. Never before had I ventured to do such an insane thing! I had made an excursion to Arizona for a friends wedding but that was like two hours shorter. However, it was made a little more bearable by the fact that I would be spending ALL 10 hours with Seth. Don't worry I warned him that this was a first...I also warned him that I do not play well when I am hungry or too hot. He being the wise man that he is, asked every ten minutes how I was doing, being sure that I was not too hot nor too hungry. What a man!
Seth and I went down with his sister Amanda and her husband Chase (awesome couple!) so luckily Seth did not have to drive all 10 hours. The first five hours Seth and I played the alphabet game, okay in reality it only lasted about 30 minutes. And that is only because there were ZERO signs, and hardly any cars traveling on the same road as us. When it started to get to the impossible letters like Q etc. I decided that I had better cheat and get the game over with. Needless to say, I won! But then Seth won five minutes later (without cheating)...stupid Quebec license plate.
Upon reaching his grandmothers home in Manassa Colorado I was relieved to find that she lived in a neighborhood. From the way Seth's family was talking about Manassa I thought that there was one house for every five miles. I was startled to find that there were only four paved roads, and no stop lights. It was wonderful to be out of the car though.
That night I slept in a tent with Seth's little sisters Marissa and Annie. We knew that we did not have to wake up early because the parade did not start till 10, thus there was little sleep and tons of partying. The next morning we were startled awake by cannon shots...all I could say was..."you have got to be kidding me"...there is no way that it is already 10 am, I scrambled to find my cell phone and found that it was 5:40 in the morning!!!! Just two and a half hours after we had gotten to sleep.
When we finally did wake up we went to the parade watched it twice that's how awesome Manassa is. That day was spent relaxing, playing volleyball, card games, hanging out with the family, and going to Harry Potter 6...or maybe 5 whichever was recently released. The next morning was Manassa Marathon time! Seth, my awesome boyfriend, got 2nd place in his age group....I might have gotten 129th...oh did I mention it wasn't a marathon it was a 5k...hahah...I know there is always room for improvement. After I finished running Seth came over to hug me...I may or may not have pushed him away, there was no air, and all I wanted to do was sit down, but he was such a sweetheart. I'll admit I was so proud when he won a trophy for doing so well.
After that the same parade from the day before went up and down the road again. We had another day of relaxation and card games. I learned how to play rook! The next day was Sunday the day we had planned to come home. So Amanda, Chase, Seth and I woke up around 6 and got ready to leave the fun town of Manassa. We then made the loooong journey back home. I'll admit after getting lost once...I got a little claustrophobic. I was definitely grateful to be out of the car. But it was a wonderful vacation! I would have never imagined to have had so much fun in Manassa Colorado. Again as soon as I get pictures I will post them up of this awesome adventure!

Emily Mayda visit to utah

So I actually haven't been very busy lately. Which is probably why I haven't written anything, I just assumed I had nothing huge to talk about OR I am just not on the computer blogging all the time. About two weeks ago I was lucky to have Emily Mayda Low in town. I had originally been planning on spending Monday through Friday with her, however plans change. She did not fly in until Tuesday night....late Tuesday night. Luckily Seth was willing to go up with me. I had not realized how long it had been since I had driven on I-15. Everyone should be especially grateful for Seth, without him the crazy driving skills of myself would have been unleashed upon all those driving at 12 at night.
I was so happy to see Emily, it has been so so long, and I won't be able to spend much time with her because she is going on a mission! I am so proud of my best friend! (shout out to all former roommates...you all make me proud too!). Emily was so tired we just went home and slept. The next day I had to work but all* of the girlies from DT the REG and Miller met up for lunch at the coveted Thai Ruby (*Everyone except Becca who scheduled herself into a work meeting for that exact hour...meanie, haha jk Becca). It was delicious...and as soon as I figure out how to post pictures of that wonderful event I will. Afterwords some of the chica's split and Trish, Em, and I went and visited some old miller guy friends..and then the old miller itself. From there Trish, Em, Janae, Leslie, and I went to Color Me Mine. What a quaint little pottery shop. It was so much fun being creative...and not worrying about what it would like...although I could tell that Trish and Em did care because we stayed at that blessed place for two hours. Long enough for treat time. YUM!
I am sure we would have stayed later but Trish had a hot date! So Emily and I went home and slept to catch up on the little sleep that both of us had had the night before and then went to Joe Galloway's birthday party. The next morning I went to work and dropped Em off with Trisha. I was nervous for this work morning, I was teaching for BYU weekly. Although I will admit I shouldn't have been nervous considering I was teaching a stress management course. Surprisingly it went very well. The only part I wasn't expecting was an interview. I probably sounded really dumb, so please do not watch BYU weekly...EVER! thank you.
Directly after that, I went home and packed in a rush, earlier in the week Seth had invited me to Manassa, and yes that is the correct spelling. To Be Continued....

Ta Da

Bloggers, family, and friends, yes this is a new post, SURPRISE!!! No I figure I better post something this summer. I just haven't figured out how to have a cool background without erasing all of my side bars...again. So here is a quick catch up. I am working Part time at the Counseling and Career Center, my more specific office is The Career Center and Academic Success Center. I know, I know, a bunch of fancy words that don't say anything about what we actually do, considering that there is a career center two doors down from us and an academic center right next door to us. In reality we do A LOT more than just sitting at a desk, we are forced to sit at the desk, and get all of our projects done. Of which is impossible because people are constantly coming in for help....help finding the bathroom or some odd place around campus. If we were an Information Commons...we would post Information Commons on our door, above our door, to the side of our door, just as we have posted it for the ever so impressive Career Center and Academic Success Center.....*hold on a sec, gotta catch my breath every time I have to say the whole thing* okay we're good.

My specific assignment is workshops, which is 70% of the reason that we are located where we are. Recently, we have been working on updating the workshops and it has taken a lot of work to push the oldies (or Workshop Masters, as they call themselves) to find a better approach at teaching the material. Even worse, the students that come into this job sometime have NO teaching experience at all. So I don't know about you but.....yeah, that was the most frustrating thing for me. I realize that we need so much help in our center, but I am so thankful for this job. At least I have one, one that I really like doing (teaching) I never would have thought that I would enjoy teaching kids my age...well, actually I am a little older, considering I am a senior in college this year. Which means nothing because I am just barely applying to a new major that I really really hope to get into.

This Fall I am applying to the Communications department with an emphasis in Comms studies. And then in Winter semester for Public Relations. Either emphasis would satisfy me. I am really excited to learn more about Communications. If you are wondering what I am still doing in school here it is. I hope to major in Communications emphasis in Public Relations, I am minoring in history, and I plan to be out of school in a year and a half. Wahoo! BYU has been a lot of fun, but I am excited to get out and start working. However, maybe this year and a half waiting period will be good for our economy and the job market. I can only cross my fingers.

Other than that, the news you have all been waiting for. Seth has been home since May 23, almost 24 days. We have been dating for almost two weeks. It has been so much fun catching up with and spending time with him! It is so crazy how little he has changed...I mean he has changed, but it has only been for the better. The weirdest thing about him being back is hearing him speak Khmer. It is such a strange language but there is so much more to learn about the Cambodians. We were looking at some of his mission pictures last night and it was amazing how much love he has for the Cambodian people. He also took pictures at the Angkor Watt geeze, places I have only read about in history books and he has gone there! It was really fun I am excited to learn more. I would post pictures but we haven't really taken any. So I will work on that.

I think that pretty much catches everyone up to speed, oh except for the fact that MARY is Engaged! Mary and I thought it would be pretty funny to pull a prank on the family...I would say it was successful but apparently everyone else was like "what announcement could Julie possibly have"....dang, here were Seth and I trying to be awkward and surprising, and all we got was a few rolled eyes from Mom and Dad and Tim asking if I was pregnant, real great! Goll my family has a sense of humor.

Life as it is

So this last week was my birthday and boy was it good! it was a true birthday week! the festivities began last Tuesday where my roommates surprised me with gifts galore counting down the days till I would be the big 21! Saturday was my friend party where we had my friends come over to chat and to have cake. Can I tell you how much pressure is put on the birthday girl to entertain. I loved the party, but gosh sometimes I was afraid that people thought I was boring or something because all I was doing was trying to catch up with people.

After cake which was so generously provided by my loving roommate Trisha, we headed to Classic Skating. Where I immediately came to realize I have not skated in YEARS! I also had not realized how popular it was....there were tonz of people there. By the way we were dressed up because it was disco night. So here are some pics from that, it was definitely a blast!

This is Trisha my roommate and myself

This is Kelsey, Michael, and I trying to show off our awesome skills.

So after that we came back and played games and said good night. It was by far the best party I have had in a long time! It was really good to see old friends and new friends become good friends.

Monday was the family party and can I just tell you how amazing Deborah is! well she is amazing! she made my cake and it was beautiful.... and yes that is fondant. Best Family Birthday EVER!!!!

So then comes my real birthday day...MARCH 3 for those of you who are still unsure as to when I was really born. I didnt do anything too crazy. I went to school and then worked for six hours, I then came home ate left over pizza and chilled on the couch doing "homework" (I fell asleep) after being awakened which is something that my roommates never do because they realize the vengeance of Julie. Trisha, Emily, and Laura then went to 7-11 with me for a weekly ritual of getting hot cocoa. On our way back from visiting a good friend. Anna (my room roommate) had called and was acting kinda weird so we walk in and I go to get some tums *vital when sugar intake has greatly exceeded over a four day period. When Kelsey said, "Julie can I borrow your scriptures..." I was like "okay? what happened to yours?"...then Anna said "Julie I made your bed you should go look at it." By this point I was like what the heck is going on? What did they do to my bed...and I walk in and see my best friends and old roommates Leanne Lecheminant, Becca Snyder, Alex Ahern, and Kelsi Brimhall sitting on my bed!!!!!! oh what a good surprise! I Love my friends!

Thanks to everyone who made this day (or rather week) so special. I cannot thank you all enough!