Our Green Thumbs

We have started a little garden on our balcony, and we love it! It is so exciting and fulfilling to see the growth and change that has happened in the five weeks since we planted it. It took us a long time to get started: we wanted to wait until after finals, then after it got warm, then we couldn't decide what to plant, then finally we just found an afternoon where we had time and did it! We started out with strawberries, beets, sweet peppers, and peas.

The first day!

We kind of cheated with a strawberry start, but we have heard it is so hard to get strawberries to grow from seeds. I figure, we are beginners, so its okay to take all the help we can get. When we left for California, we only had a few little sprouts. While we were gone, it seemed that everything woke up from a deep slumber and decided to grow a little bit!

After we got back, we had a Relief Society Activity about self-reliance/the Law of the Harvest and at the end of the lesson we had them plant seeds as an illustration for "that which ye sew ye shall also reap." There I got a green pepper plant and a tomato plant (which, neither of us are crazy about tomatoes, but figured maybe we would eat them if they were home grown?). The green pepper plant was a little sad at first, but then a flower started to form! A good sign! However, all of the leaves whithered and fell off, probably not a good sign. So hopefully they are doing well and will pull through! The tomato plant could not have been more opposite! It is like we flipped a switch and all of a sudden it just sprung out of it's shell and grew to more than 2 feet tall!

the Newbies: green pepper and tomato plants

Our booming strawberry bush

Our sad squished beets

Sweet peppers finally poking out!

Sweet peas are just shooting out!

We're in Boise visiting Nathan's family, so hopefully our little garden doesn't shrivel up at our absence. And I had already started this while at home, don't worry I'm not that obsessed with getting this thing posted on all the time. I just wanted to finish when we had a bit of down time!

The culmination of all things educational

Finals are approaching... and with it my brain is disappearing!

For some reason, during my busiest times, my mind loves to come up with things it would rather think about than the task at hand. All things crafty and homemade are swirling around in my brain, and I can't get ideas of what I want to do this summer to subside while I'm trying to remember what I've learned for the past 4 months. This seriously happens all the time! I can't control it. Well, at least not yet. But I'm getting lots of fun ideas for painting and sewing and such to decorate my wonderfully cinderblocked apartment. I also have this strange urge to write a book--but have no idea what it would be about! I don't even know enough of anything to write a book! Also, Nate has this wonderful Family Home Evening lesson about gardening, and so we are planning on starting a mini one after this semester on our little balcony, which I am pretty excited about.

In other news, my friend Alise Coombs had her little baby boy! I am so excited for her and her hubby Phill, even though I had to find out from my mom (refer to previous post about no Facebook for Lyndsey).

I am just SO HAPPY now. I love my life, and am so blessed. I enjoy the fact I am almost done with school for the semester. I have a pretty fun job working at Yogurtland, despite the fact that everyone thinks I'm making up the name. BONUS: I also am being promoted to shift leader (woo!) and don't have to wear the goofy visor anymore, plus I get more moolah. I also get to start my job at the Missionary Training Center in the Human Resources department, which I am even more excited about! It will be great to work in such a wonderful environment, and Nate and I will be working at the same place. Double Bonus: it is a 10 minute walk from our apartment, so no wasting gas! My family is doing well, and (as they tell me) all are happy and doing well! My friends are finding the loves of their lives, and consequently there will be about 6 weddings this summer. That just makes me even happier, knowing they are happy and in love (eww)!

And the best part of everything-- My husband Nathan. He is so wonderful to me, I could never ask for anything better. Knowing that I get to see my best friend and eternal companion and spend time with him just keeps me happy all day. Every day my love grows! He is so dedicated to his school work, and so positive about his job (and who wouldn't be-- it's like the top job in town!) it inspires me to work harder and do better. We have our funny little jokes. We watch Seinfeld every night before bed. We check up on each other to make sure our homework is getting done. We play card games in our pajamas and spy from our back porch. It is an ordinary, married college student life. But its the best one I could ask for.