Forza Italia!

We're so excited because we're going to Italy August 5 until August 18. BJ served his mission there and we are excited to go back and visit many of the people he taught and served with. Of course, we're going to stop in Venice and Florence though he didn't serve in those cities. Many people wonder "why not Rome?" That just gives us an excuse to go back!!!
Here is the map of our plans

View Our Italy Trip in a larger map
Thursday, August 6 - Arrive at Milan, Italy and drive immediately to Torino.
Saturday, August 8 - Go to Piacenza (we had to get a hotel in the city of Cremona.) We'll go to Church here.
Sunday, August 9 - Drive to Lugano Switzerland. We'll stay with Liliana Sampietro (she lives near the Church)
Tuesday, August 11 - Drive to Venice, Italy
Thursday, August 13 - Drive To Florence, Italy
Saturday, August 15 - Drive to Rimini, Italy
Monday, August 17 - Return to Milan, Italy
Tuesday, August 18 - Fly home

We have lots of stops and places and are excited to get worn out and visit the most beautiful place in the world! Forza Italia!

BJs Mom

During Mothers Day, my Mom came to visit us. She mostly came to watch me walk for graduation, but it was great having her here for Mothers Day. Here are some of the pictures from my graduation and family pictures :)These were taken by my sister-in-law Anna. You can check out more of her pictures at www.nimfahtography.com

St. George

During Christie's one and a half week break we took a 2 day trip down to St. George. It wasn't anything grand, but we thought it would be a lot of fun just to get away. Here are some pictures from the trip

SWIMMING

We found a sign with our name on it - how cool is that!

We also were able to visit the St. George Temple

Christie made the newspaper

Here's Christie at school in the newspaper (Davis Clipper!) She looks like she is having so much fun

Open publication - Free publishing - More davis

I laughed so hard when I saw this

HOUSE pictures

OK ok I know I was supposed to post these FOREVER ago. Whoopsies. Well, here they are. Some pictures of our new house TENNEY STYLE. Well it is not exactly Tenney style yet...it will be after I paint :) but it will at least show you what it looks like for now.

We are loving being home owners. It is very busy and there is always something to do. We planted our garden as you saw with my previous post, we bought a lawn mower, BJ is working hard at taking care of the dandelions, and we have both done some minor decorating.

Our neigbors are awesome. We LOVE our ward. LOVE the bishop and already feel like we know him really well. We are excited to get to know more of our neigbors and ward over the summer.

Like I said before, with a house there is an endless to do list and one of those is cleaning the bathrooms. We have 2 1/2 bathrooms and since BJ hates cleaning bathrooms and does all the outside stuff ....that leaves me to do them. You would think I would be smart and only use one bathroom so there is less to clean. NOPE I use all 3! I dont even think about it until the end of the day and I realized that I had used all three bathrooms! Ridiculous seriously!!!

Oh and we got new couches!!! Woot woot. LOVE them. We seriously sat on over 25 couches before we found these at RC Willey clearance. I was pretty excited. I went by myself, called BJ and bought them right then. It was the biggest thing I have bought without having someone else discuss it with me. But we love them and have gotten a lot of compliments on how comfortable they are which is what we were going for! Score. Now I just have to paint so they dont match our walls. ha ha

This is a picture of my walk in closet. It is so fun to have so much space. We both feel so so so blessed right now!

Our guest bedroom

The upstairs bathroom

Our office

Our laundry room. We have a dryer for the first time in our marriage. We have always just dried our clothes by hanging them. We couldn't fit a dryer in our old apartment and BJ was used to it from his mission in Italy. Can I just say I LOVE having a dryer!!! It is wonderful. I went on a laundry rampage for awhile. I am doing better now. :)

Vegetable Garden/ Womens Conference

OUR Garden! :D We have planted anything and everything in this garden (pumpkin, watermelon, carrots, lettuce, herbs, green peppers, tomatoes, green beans, peas and more....). We are hoping they will come up, we added fertilized soil but the dirt is still hard and has the consistency of clay. But hopefully by adding good soil to it over the next years it will start to show.

Our tomatoes in the water walls are doing really really well! Which is good cause BJ and I LOVE tomatoes!!! We also planted some flowers in the front by the door which I am totally excited for. I love vegetables but I really wanted to plant flowers. The only thing I am worried about with having the flowers so close to the front door is bees. But really not a lot of people come to the front door (salesmen, hometeachers, parents) eh, I guess it wouldn't be so bad after all. TOTALLY joking!!! :) Speaking of parents.

* that was a good transition huh jk

I got the opportunity to go to Women's conference with my sister in-law (my mother in-law ended up having to watch kids :( and my grandma, mom and some sisters were there as well. It was so much fun!! I drove up with Jamie (sister in-law) and came home with my mom and went to dinner with the family at Texas Roadhouse. It was fun to spend so much time with family but the best part was the things I learned. I felt like I was a different/better person after leaving. I learned so much and felt the spirit so strong. Got answers to questions I didn't realize I was asking. I highly recommend going next year ladies!!!

Nurse Christie - part 1 of 2

Christie graduated with her LPN (Licensed Practical Nursing) last week! She has been going non-stop and only got a week and a half off. Regardless, this is the first step towards becoming an RN. Only 2 more semesters to go (that's 4 consecutive semesters) and she'll be there! I am so proud of her and all the work that she is putting in. You may hear her say she's ready to quit, which she may be tired of the work, but she loves caring for people and will make a great nurse!

Here are a few pictures from her graduation - Go Christie!

Christie sang in a small choir

Oh yeah! Just after getting her certificate
Some of the girls who make it possible (after a smart comment by Ashley's husband)

Thanks to the family as well