Gone Fishin'

Historically, I've been a bad fisher. I went a few times when I was younger with my dad, but the only thing I've ever caught is a crawdad. Last summer while Scott and I were living at the lake house, we went fishing a couple of times off the dock, but never caught anything. Once I came close - I had a fish nibbling the bait and everything! Unfortunately, another, much bigger fish darted out from under the dock (right below where I was standing), and it scared me so bad I screamed. Pretty sure I scared off all the fish in the area. Obviously, I'm not the prime choice for a fishing companion.

So when Brian asked if Scott and I wanted to go fishing with him one night, I was pretty excited. Seriously, the whole goal of this fishing trip was for me to catch a fish. Brian is so awesome - he would cast out to a good spot and then give the pole to me. He just sat there the whole entire time telling me when to reel in a little bit, when to tug, and when to jerk the line. So sweet, especially because I seriously had no idea what the heck I was doing. I had a few nibbles here and there, but finally, FINALLY, I got a real bite, and the bobber went all the way under the water. I jerked and hooked my first fish!! I don't know much about fish, but Scott and Brian told me it was a pretty big one. It took forever to get it in (it put up a pretty big fight), but I was so excited. My first fish ever! To be honest, it was really gross. I never even touched the thing - Scott and Brian did that for me, ha!

Seriously this is as close as I got.

It's so big!! I didn't know this: after a fish has been out of water for a long time, you have to hold it up for a bit so it can regain its strength or else it drowns and dies!

The panorama setting in my camera has started putting black streaks like this one in pictures. Anybody know how to fix/change it? Still, what an absolutely beautiful night.

No filters added to these pictures. Utah is really amazing. I couldn't stop taking pictures the whole night!

It was such a fun night. I'm definitely excited to go again soon! Another awesome thing that happened this week: LITTLE BUBBY TURNED 12! Except for 1) he's not so little anymore, and 2) now that he's 12, I should probably stop calling him "little bubby", ha! I got to FaceTime with him and the rest of my family while they were at El Mez (seriously the best restaurant ever) for his birthday dinner. I love that guy so much - I can't believe he is growing up so fast. 

Ok seriously though, with that cute face how could you not call him Little Bubby?! :) Happy birthday Carter!! Love ya dude.

Pinsperation: Paint Swatch Calendars

I know I've said this a time or two before, but I am SO grateful for my two sisters-in-law who have become such good friends to me, and who make it so much easier to be so far away from home. We missed Whitney this time, but Nicole and I took a night to do a super fun Pinterest project. I am way excited about how it turned out. We had so much fun doing this together, and it was VERY simple to make (although a bit time consuming - if you want to do this project, I would plan about 3 or 4 hours total). Materials you will need: a poster frame (ours were 22 3/8" x 34"), paint swatches, rubber cement, and a corner rounding tool.

We used this tutorial. I even used similar colors she did, because I loved the color scheme and it added some really nice colors to our apartment. Nicole did a super cute rainbow ombre design. For more ideas, just go to Pinterest and search "paint swatch calendar" and tons of options will pop up.

The first step was choosing colors. Honestly, I think this was the hardest part. Whenever I start projects like this, I want it to turn out EXACTLY how I'm picturing it, so I was nervous choosing colors because I wanted it all to come together how I saw it in my head. I got my paint swatches at Walmart (I felt like a thief for taking so many, haha). I chose swatches that had the punch out circle at the top, because I thought they made a great place for the date. Anyway, here are the colors I chose:

Sorry for the shadow. Also, these are already trimmed and the corners rounded, I will explain how I did that next.

After I chose my colors, I trimmed each swatch down, so that there was just a little space above the punched out circle. Since the swatches were different brands, this made some of them different heights than others, but I wanted a more uniform look in the space between the circle and the top of the swatch, rather than a uniform overall height of the paint swatches. I am happy with how it turned out, but Nicole did hers the other way (so that all the paint swatches are the same height, but they are differing in space between the top of the circle and the top of the swatch) and hers looks very nice as well. I think it just comes down to personal preference. I used a ruler and scissors and cut each swatch myself, which worked fine, but if you have a paper cutter or some other tool that will do the job for you, it will save a LOT of time.Then I punched out the circles and used a corner rounder to (obviously) round each of the corners. 

This isn't absolutely necessary, I just felt like it gave it a more finished look. Again, personal preference.

In the tutorial we used, she glued fabric to the cardboard square that comes with the poster frame. However, to save a little time, money, and effort, we just flipped over the paper that comes in the frame and used the white side. The next thing I did was lay out all of the colors to try and find the pattern I liked best. After that, I measured everything off and glued them down. Nicole eye-balled hers and it turned out great. If I could do it again, I think that would be the way I would do it - you can't tell a difference between the two (hers look every bit as straight and even as mine), and she saved a lot of time. The spacing at the top and bottom of the paper, as well as between the paint swatches, is completely up to you. 

Remember the circles I punched out of each swatch? Here is where I put them to use. I glued three circles down above each column, so that they were overlapping with the middle one on top. Then I just took a pen, and wrote a lowercase, cursive letter for each day of the week. I thought this added a cute personal touch, and I love it! It might be my favorite part of the whole calendar. There are several different ways to write the day though, it's up to you! I didn't take a close up picture of my days of the week, but you can kind of see how I did it in my "finished product" picture. Anyway, after that I just flipped the paper over, clipped the cardboard back in, and wrote everything on it with a dry erase marker - voila! 

I realize there are 31 days in May! Don't worry, I fixed it :)

My finished product is on the left, Nicole's is on the right. Her's is in Polish in case you can't read it :)

Like I've stressed through this whole post, my favorite thing about this project is that it is totally "customizable!" Nicole served her mission in Poland, so she chose to write everything in Polish, and I left extra space at the bottom to write quotes or notes. The best part is, if you don't like something, erase it and start over! This is a fun and easy project to add a little organization to your life. Thanks for doing it with me Nicole!

April Overview

[WARNING: Loooong Post]

I'm so bad at blogging!! Hopefully now that things have settled down and I'm back in a routine I will get better at it.

I am now a graduated woman!! What a fantastic feeling. It was a great weekend too - my parents flew out from Indiana and we got to spend a few days together. It is such a crazy thing to graduate from college. I've spend my whole life in school, and now all of a sudden that's all over. I have to say though, I don't really mind not being in school anymore. Right now it just feels like a normal summer break, but I'm sure when Scott goes back to school in the fall, it will start to feel more like I really graduated. A few graduation pictures:

Scott was my paparazzi for the day. This picture is one of many candid shots :)

That's my diploma in there!

I am SO grateful for each of these people. They're the best. For real.

My sister Rae says I always pose with my hand on my hip... I see what she means, ha! But, I love these pictures, I love the memories I have from that day, and I especially love the three other people in the pictures. I am one lucky girl to have such a support group. After I graduated, we went to Oakley to spend some time with my grandma. Yay for spending two weekends in a row in one of my favorite places! We relaxed, got to spend some time with my both my grandma and my great-grandma, and had lots of fun. On Monday, Mom and I got pedicures, and then it was time to say goodbyes. I HATE goodbyes. And I'm not very good at them. I'm ready to move back to Indiana!! Thanks for coming out here Mom and Dad! It was so fun to see you and I can't wait to see you again! I love you!

That same day, Scott and I headed to Montana to spend some time with his mom. Neither of us got scheduled to work that week, which is a rarity, so we took full advantage. What a fun trip! We shot some guns, played lots of games, got to spend some fun time with his mom. Also, one of Scott's friends has a plane and his pilot's license, so we got to go up in that for a while. Talk about breathtaking views!!

Sorry the video isn't the best quality - it doesn't do near justice to how breath taking the view was. But, seriously a fantastic week. One great thing we did recently was go to the temple with Scott's siblings. This is one of my favorite things to do. I LOVE going to the temple, and the peace it brings to me. I can be having the worst day, and going to the temple really does make everything better. It brings a lot of perspective. I am also so grateful for the family I married into - talk about some awesome people. It has been so fun to live so close to all of them for the best year and a half. Lots of fun memories! We decided that while we live so close to so many temples in Utah, we would try and go to one new one a month. This was an adventure though! We were going to go to Oquirrh Mountain, then some plans changed, so we decided on Mount Timpanogos, which was closed. Finally, we ended up at Draper. I was still excited though - I have never been to Draper, and it didn't disappoint. So beautiful! 

Easter

Ok, so it's been a while since I've blogged. Finals have started, and I'm GRADUATING in 4 days!! Good excuses... This weekend, we went to my grandma's house in Oakley, Idaho to celebrate Easter with my family. I LOVE my family - they are all so great. It's so much fun to spend time with them. We colored eggs, had a giant Easter egg hunt, played games, threw the frisbee a little, and watched a movie. Plus, we just relaxed, which was fabulous. Some pictures:

The view from my grandma's house. Oakley is so beautiful - the picture doesn't do it justice, it seriously could be a scene right out of a painting.

This might be one of my new favorite pictures. I love it!

Minions assemble!

My grandma is SO cute!!

My cousin Ashley - I love her!

Scott and I have a fun-filled couple of weeks ahead of us. My parents are flying out this week for my graduation. I. Cannot. Wait. To. See. Them. I love my parents tons!! We are going back to my grandma's house, which will also be fun. I am just really excited to spend some time with them. The only thing that would make it better would be if Rae and Carter and Malyssa could come - but I will get to see Rae and Cart in a couple more months. Next week, both Scott and I are not scheduled to work. This seriously hasn't happened since our honeymoon! We are very excited! We decided we are going to go up to Montana to spend some time with Scott's mom. I am excited to explore Montana some more. If you haven't been there, you're missing out. More posts and pictures to come soon!!

April Fool's

(Written Wednesday, April 2)

Well, I had quite the eventful April Fool's Day. Growing up, my mom always had fun with this day. Some of my favorite pranks: being woken up in a rush, saying that we overslept and we were going to miss the bus. Only to find out - after I had rushed around for 20 minutes to get ready - that my parents had set the clocks forward an hour, and we had plenty of time. At least I got to watch some TV before school. Another one: spending the whole day wondering why my bag was so heavy, and then getting home and finding rocks hidden in very sneaky places in my back pack. Haha! Good memories. So, when I got to work yesterday and realized that it was FINALLY April Fool's Day, I was kind of SO excited. Why, you ask? Because my good friend Rachel had given me an idea for a prank about five months ago, and I have been waiting for April Fool's to come around so I could play this very prank on Scott.

THE PLAN: Create a fake KSL account, and advertise a ferret that I no longer had time to take care of, and therefore needed to sell. And of course for the contact information, I put Scott's phone number. When Rachel did this trick to one of her friends, he got tons of calls and emails asking about the little animal he was selling, so I was expecting the same to happen for Scott. Unfortunately, no such luck. However, and much to my delight, I had done the same thing to my dad, only with a chinchilla and his contact information. He had been receiving a few calls/texts, and he was kind of freaked out, so I told him what was going on and then changed the info on that ad to Scott's contact information. Then, I sat back and waited.

Finally, I got a text from Scott, asking if I knew anything about a chinchilla, and why he had a bunch of people asking if "Betsy" was still available. Maybe this is lame, but I was laughing so hard. Luckily, our conversation was over text message, or else I would have given it away as soon as he asked. Eventually though, I spilled the beans, and he tried to convince me that the police were looking around trying to find the creators of all the fraudulent ads on April Fool's Day. Ok, guys, I am not that gullible, and I really didn't believe him... Yet. But, when I got a (very legit sounding) call to my work phone from a man asking to speak to whoever was over employees in the office, because they had traced the IP address of one of the fake adds back to the Psych office, I started to get a little nervous. And by a little I mean sweaty palms, racing heart, watering eyes (although I swear I wasn't crying, my eyes really do water just as a reaction!!). Finally the fake investigator started laughing - I was pretty relieved. So that was our April Fool's.

Just so you know, the next day Scott finally had several people contact him about Gus the ferret. He told some people that we gave Gus away, and told some others that Gus had a heart attack the day before so he was no longer available :)

Happy Wednesday!

St. Patrick's Day

What a weekend! I cannot BELIEVE it's Tuesday already. So, about six months ago, I bought a bunch of fabric online planning to reupholster my kitchen chairs. The original plan was to spray paint them red, and do the seat cushions, but I quickly realized that spray painting them was going to be pretty near impossible. Living in a small apartment, with no back yard, there isn't much freedom as far as spray painting kitchen chairs goes. Anyways, I finally got around to doing the actual cushions. My aunt and uncle (who have seriously been life savers for me since I've been here in Utah) found the table and chairs at a garage sale for free, which we were excited about. They are really beautiful, the wood work and the design are just stunning. But the fabric - not so much. Anyways, it's been on my list for a while, but between laziness and business, I just got to it this weekend. Let me just say, I am SO happy with how they turned out. Sometimes when I attempt projects it doesn't go the way I had planned in my head, and that's disappointing. So I was nervous. Here is the before picture:

These chairs have potential! But, the fabric is nice and outdated, and plus it was stained with who knows what, and I was just ready for an update. So, drum roll... The finished product:

Obviously, I have shoes all out all over the house. This is a habit of mine, always has been, ask my dad. I'm trying to kick it, which you might think would be easy, but it's not. If I was thinking ahead I would have cleaned up a bit before taking these pictures, ha. Anyways, I am just in love with how the chairs turned out. I'd say they were a success - and it makes me want to make over everything in my house!! Thanks to my sweet husband who unscrewed all the cushions and also screwed them back in. For like 3 hours. He is a trooper.

We had a fun St. Patrick's Day! Scott was excited for it. He said to me yesterday (several times, in an accent), "Sheahan is Irish, ya know, Lassie?" Side note, you would actually be surprised how many people, when they see my last name on my name plate at work, ask me if my husband has red hair or if we had a "big Irish wedding" (no and no, although his beard is pretty red). It's funny... So anyways, he was excited. Growing up, we always did green pancakes and green milk on St. Patricks Day. One of my favorite memories from those mornings is Malyssa practically crying because the green pancakes grossed her out so much. She thought they looked moldy. I was planning on continuing this tradition, but that would require getting up even earlier than normal. And when my alarm went off, I decided that wasn't going to happen. So we had them for dinner instead! I made green Rice Krispie treats too. Yum!!

Isn't he just so cute??

 After dinner we played my new favorite game, Bananagrams. I'm OBSESSED with it. It's so fun. Luckily, Scott's a good sport and plays with me a lot.

As you can see, somebody doesn't like losing. And somebody has yet to beat his wife at Bananagrams. But, that's why he's a good sport - he keeps playing with me anyways. And that's why I love him :) Happy (late) St. Patty's Day everyone!

The Little Things

What a great past couple of days. Big news ... Scott has an interview for an internship!! Phew, this has been kind of nerve-wracking to be honest. My eyes have really been opened to how difficult it can be to get an internship. I'm just going to throw this out there, but Scott is a pretty dang good student. Super high GPA, plenty of experience, and lots of good recommendations. Last year when he was looking for internships, there were understandably limited offers, given that he didn't have much experience and was only a junior. But this year, we thought it would be a breeze. No such luck... But hopefully, if all goes well with the interview, we will be headed to Los Alamos, New Mexico for the summer. The internship is with the Los Alamos National Laboratory, and apparently it's top secret. Literally. He has to pass some test thing and won't be allowed to talk to me about any of the work he is doing if he gets the job! I am just glad that he is so excited about this opportunity, and I think it will be fun to live in a new place for the summer, too.

I have been putting in a lot of hours between my two jobs. I still am enjoying working in the Psych department. It has been a good and steady job for me throughout college. My new job, at the Sundance Spa has been so, so great. I love it! I love the people I work with, I love the location and feel of the spa. It definitely keeps me busy, and wears me out sometimes too, but I love it. If anyone from the Provo/Salt Lake area reads this post, I HIGHLY recommend getting treatments from the spa - seriously, they are so great. Best massage I've had!!

Sunday night, Scott and I went up to the temple and walked around for a while. It was SO nice to have weather that was finally comfortable enough to take a walk in at night. My love for temples has definitely grown a ton since I got married in one and also since I took a class on them last semester. Anyways, I just loved walking up there for a while. It was SO beautiful. And of course my love for Scott has grown a ton in the past ten (what??) months we've been married. I am so grateful for him, and I hope I show him that enough.

Lately I've been trying a lot of Pinterest things, so I think my next post will be dedicated to successes/failures of my Pinterest attempts. Until then!

This picture is up all over my social media - Facebook, Instagram, now my blog. And it's also the background on my phone and work computer. Ha! Good thing I don't get tired of it!!

A Few Extras

We finally had a date night last weekend! Guys, that doesn't happen very often. I can honestly say that Scott is the busiest person I know, so between that and the nights that I am assigned the PM shift at work, we really don't get much time for dates. This time, we went to the Provo Beach Resort. It is a super fun place with one of those indoor surfing things, a ropes course, bowling, miniature croquet, and an arcade with all sorts of games. We did the ropes course and played some arcade games, but next time we go I would love to do the surfing too. It looks fun. I've never been to a ropes course before, and this one definitely lived up to my expectations. It was so, SO, fun to just have a relaxing night together and not have homework or projects hanging over our heads. We played some fun arcade games after the ropes course - Scott beat me in all of them, I'm sorry to say. I wasn't on my game that night I guess. When we got home, we ordered a pizza and rented the movie Gravity. I am not a fan of that movie, let me tell you!! But Scott loved it - fitting since he wants to go into aerospace engineering! I just loved spending the time together though. Great night!

I've recently discovered a huge love for interior design. Maybe Pinterest sparked my interest in it, but I'm also taking an interior design class this semester, and not only have I learned a lot, but I've had tons of fun doing it. I'm by no means an expert, it's probably just going to be more of a hobby for now, but I've been trying to find cute ways to decorate our apartment (harder to do than you might think with stark white walls and NASTY carpet, but it's coming along). I was reading the blog of a super cute DIY-er from home and found the Easy Canvas Prints website. Lucky for me, they were had a 65% off deal going when I checked it out. So I ordered three prints!! For some reason, ordering stuff off the internet makes me super paranoid, so I always get really nervous until the things I've ordered actually arrive and I'm happy with them. I just want everything to work out exactly how I've planned in my head! Seriously though, how much easier would life be if everything worked out how we are counting on it working out?? Anyways, I'm anxiously awaiting their arrival, and I'll write a post when I get them put up on the wall. So far though, I would totally recommend their company and website - the whole process has been way easy (and a steal of a deal). 

Do you have any cute ideas for sprucing up your house? Let me know!

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Sisters

Today, I feel grateful for sisters. I have one sister on a mission in Brazil (well, right now she is serving in Washington state waiting for her visa to clear - but she will be in Brazil). Her name is Malyssa. She is my best friend, really the only person (outside of my husband and probably my parents) that knows everything there is to know about me. She is funny and smart and seriously one of the nicest people I've ever met. I have so many fun memories with her - like I could write several posts just about those. You just can't be around her without laughing. One time this summer, we went to Pizza Hut for dinner, but we ended up staying for 4 or 5 hours just talking. And taking tons of selfies. She just left from the Provo MTC to head into the mission field in Washington, which was really weird for me. Even though she might as well have been in Washington the whole time because we couldn't see each other or talk or text or anything, I guess it was really comforting for me to live so close to each other (my apartment is about a quarter mile from the MTC). Probably a little weird. Anyway, I miss her and cannot wait for her to get back from her mission. Only 17 months to go :)

My other sister is a freshman in high school. This is Rae, and she is just SO cute! We like to face time a lot, mostly while she is supposed to be going to bed or doing homework. It has been so fun for me to grow closer to her. We have always had a good relationship, but now that she is a little older, and I've learned to appreciate my family far better, our relationship has grown to another level. She is something else, haha! She loves to tease, and if I ever try and dish it back, she always has something smart (and hilarious) waiting. I love her quick wit! She is probably the best athlete out of the three of us (but never the best basketball player :) ), and seriously can run like you wouldn't believe. I just face timed her last night, and I had to leave to go to an intramural basketball game, so I texted her after and told her I loved her and it was fun talking. We got into a little friendly texting competition about who is the better athlete, and when I told her I had to go for real, she said Adios, see you next time I lap you! Ha! Little stink. But I love her, and I especially love our phone calls and texts.

Sometimes I get a little homesick being all the way across the country from my family; I will be forever grateful for my patient and supportive husband. He's a stud. But, I'm also extremely grateful for my two sisters I gained through marriage. They are endlessly sweet and caring, and are always ready to help. Aside from being beautiful, they are smart and kind, and so fun to be around. Nicole is so talented in many ways, but especially musically. She wrote Scott and I a song as part of a wedding gift, and it is still one of my favorites. It's beautiful. Whitney is selfless, and always the first to ask me how I'm doing and how things are going. I am grateful for her strong testimony and the example she is to me. I am so glad for their friendship and love, and the support they've given to me. I've seriously felt welcomed into their family from the beginning. I know not everybody gets that blessing, and I am so glad that I did. I love them both to pieces and I'm excited for all the fun things we get to do together in the future. 

[ Rae ... Malyssa ... Me ... Nicole ... Whitney ]

Valentine's Day

I've never been a big fan of Valentine's Day. I don't know, I guess I've always just felt it was a little silly. But, I might have become a believer this year! We had such a fun day. Scott and I wanted to try and keep things simple (and cheap!), and it turned out perfect. I had to work in the morning, and Scott had class until 5, so after I got home - and while he was still on campus - I made him a dinner of marinated steak and twice baked potatoes, with heart-shaped red velvet brownies for dessert, and heart-attacked the house. It was fun to see his reaction when he got home.

I decided to make him a gift, inspired by Pinterest of course! It is called, 52 Reasons I love You. It was really fun to make too - once I started thinking of all the reasons I love Scott, they just started flowing! I probably could have done "500 Reasons..." but that would have defeated the cuteness! So the idea is that he gets to open one reason each week, for one year. Here is how I did it:

I bought brown Kraft paper, Baker's twine, and a little tag all at a craft store here in Provo. I already had a mason jar and a Sharpie pen, which I also used for my project. I cut the paper into 52 strips of paper, and started writing all my reasons.

After I wrote all of my reasons, I decorated a few of the strips so it didn't get too boring. After I was finished with that part, I rolled all of the pieces of paper around my pen, and tied them up with Baker's twine.

This picture includes just a few of my rolled up strips. After I rolled everything up, I clipped the end of the Baker's twine. It was easier to tie them with the long ends, but I thought it looked better and a bit cleaner when they were all snipped. I dumped them all in the jar and decided to decorate it a bit more. So I wrote "52 Reasons" on the front of the tag and "I Love You" on the back. I used some of the left over twine and wrapped it around the jar, and tied the tag to it. I think it turned out pretty cute - what do you think??

I was excited about this gift because it is something he will be able to enjoy for the whole year. The total cost of everything was less than six dollars. 

After we ate dinner, Scott took me on a super cute date. We went to all of our favorite places in Provo. Man, it brought back so many memories. One of the places we went was Liberty Square, the apartment complex we lived in when we first met. Before we started dating, we used to play frisbee all the time in the grassy knoll in the middle of the complex. So Scott took me back there, and we played frisbee for a while. It brought back so many memories of when we had just met and became good friends, and even when we first started dating. That was definitely my favorite stop of a great night.

2.11.2014

I have decided to try my hand at blogging. To be honest, I'm not really sure what I'm doing. Plus, I am still trying to figure out the glitches of the blog - like what to call it. Also how to get the title to show up period, haha.

I have been missing my sister a little extra lately, so my first post is dedicated to her! Malyssa is my best friend, and the best sister I could ask for (one of the best - love you Rae Rae!). Right now she is serving a mission for our church to Brazil, which means I can't see, text, or call her for the next year and a half. Man, I'm proud of her, but I miss her too. Luckily, we can write each week, and that's been fun. I am so grateful for my family, and can't wait till we are all together again.