holidays...with style

so for the holidays this year, mark and I were all over the place. For Thanksgiving we went to Utah. And then for Christmas we also went to Utah, both times it was so much fun to see his family. We got the brothers all sling shots and a box of paint balls to share, I'm pretty sure welts are still healing. But we got TONS of boardgames, which is what we asked for: we had some friends over for dinner and realized we had NO board games at all- unless you count Cootie, which I do not. So, we went to Utah for Christmas, and then went back to Denver for a few days because we both used up our vacation for the wedding (there was so much I wanted to do in 2008 but couldn't because I took all my vacation for the 2 week wedding...) and then on the 30th, we flew out to wisconsin for new years with my family. Well we started to fly to the wisco but only made it to Minneapolis because we missed our connection flight to Green Bay. So we stayed at a hotel by the Mall of America with no luggage, just my carry on bag which had books, headphones, my iPod, and gum. So good morning! My contacts are welded to my eyeballs and I'm wearing the same clothes I wore yesterday, and let me warn you- I was nervous yesterday and EVERYBODY could see it (the girl hates flying!!) So, yeah- but how else to end a jam packed year than with another adventure? The hotel we're staying at: the directions to the room went like this: turn right, walk about a mile, go around the pool, turn right and you're there! But the hotel is themed funny: native American style, from the pattern on the walls to the carpet to the creepy wall art. Oh and I figured the last person in our room left the window open. Nope, the windows typically freeze on the inside of the hotel when it's 2 degrees outside, right? Yay, welcome to the Midwest Mark, enjoy being frozen. But we're glad we're here together and we can share our adventures, for now and always.

Anyways, we finally made to Wisconsin. And had almost 5 whole days with the entire family!! Wahoo- we took family pictures on the 2nd, and I'll get those up as soon as I get them :) but it was the first time in almost 3 years that all 6 kids have been together, and we added another brother to the mix. I thought it was really amazing how well Mark fit in with the family, telling jokes, and poking fun. He was even picking on Scott! And Dad made his famous Sundae Dessert for the girl's birthday, she turned 22 on the 3rd! Holy cow!! Some days I feel really old, and some days, I feel way too young to be where I am.

We both enjoyed being back East, and had a lot of fun. But we're also glad that we're done traveling so we can finish unpacking (the girl only has 2 boxes left until there are NO MORE boxes in the spare room!), and make sure everything is clean and where we want it to be before family starts showing up. For those that don't know, the girl is going to have open heart surgery in February, to help with oxygen flow and to hopefully fix the headaches. It's nothing to really worry about, there will be plenty of family here for us, and the sisters from the ward will be here for me, and the brothers are always ready to take Mark and play football or go shoot things, so I'm not worried about that. But, the surgery means, 9 or so weeks off work (YAY!!) but that also means 9 or so weeks of sitting around the house, not being able to drive. But the Wii should be very useful, and the girl got crafty, so maybe she'll make something....

Anyways, Happy New Years, Happy 2009!! We hope everyone had an amazing holiday (with how many of our friends got engaged, we KNOW it was a good one ;)!!! ) We love you all!

Take care and love always, <3>

moving and being in motion

So, we moved. Yeah, again. (Pretty sure this is time # 5 since Mark has known me, that I have moved.) But we moved from the horrible apartments to a 2 bedroom house. It's way nice, and way cute, and I LOVE IT!! We moved everything over the week of Thanksgiving (could we add anything more to that week?!) The reason we moved is 1) I don't think I want to take the stairs after the surgery 2) where would the mother's stay? and 3) apartments really are terrible. so for $30 more a month, we opted for the house, where our neighbors are far away, and there is a fence between us and their dog. We moved in last Monday, (or the Monday before Turkey Day) and already our next door neighbors brought over homemade cookies. We hung our Christmas lights up and put up our tree last week.

Things at work have been good for both of us. Mark's job is going good, he's had lots of work to keep him busy. And the girl has been finishing up lots of her jobs, just keeping busy.

We're both excited to go home to Utah for Christmas, it'll be good to see Mark's family again! Mark is excited to visit Wisconsin for New Year's with the girl's family. But before all of that happens, December 19th will be 6 months for me and Mark, and we're both way excited for that. These 6 months have gone by so darn fast. But we've loved it, it really has been alot of fun.

Oh, before I forget, I'm posting picture of the house for everybody to see. There aren't alot of pictures of the inside, we're still unpacking. :) Take care everybody, we love you!!

<3>

Halloween

Hello!! So the past month has been crazy crazy!! But it's Halloween in few days and I LOVE HALLOWEEN!! I love dressing up in costumes, I love trick-or-treating, I love carving pumpkins. Friday night was our church's "Trunk-or-treating" where the kids go around to the cars in the parkinng lot, and get candy. It's pretty fun. At church back home, everybody dressed up, kids, adults, teens, everybody. So I was way excited because me and Mark had our costumes picked out (I was a Rock Star again, and Mark was my securty guard.) He had his SECURITY shirt, some fake tattoo sleeves, and his aviator glasses. I put pink and orange color spray in my hair, wore my leggins with a mini skirt, my big black boots, a short sleeve shirt over a long sleeve shirt, and a tie. It was way fun. But we were pretty much the only adults to dress up in costumes, there were 3 others that did. Soooo... yeah....that once again made me realize just how young me and Mark really are. We went and bought pumpkins yesterday to carve them today. It was way fun, we carved them into jack-o-lanterns, Mark's pumpkin is laughing at mine, mine looks like it's dead but still smirking. So we carved them and then I baked the pumpkin seeds. Mark had never had homemade roasted pumkin seeds. I think he's hooked on them. :) We put our jack-o-lanterns out on the patio, and we're going to light them tonight.

So lately, I have been going to a series of doctor's appointments. First to figure out why I'm getting migraines for days, weeks, months on end. But the primary care physician has all these weird ideas, change my diet, change my sleeping pattern, go see an eye doctor, try all kinds of medications, but none of that worked, so I went to a chiropractor, and my headaches eased up instantly. But on the list of the PCP's THINGS TO DO was go see a cardiologist. In talking to the cardiologist, they did their own series of tests, EKG, bubble study, 24-hour ekg monitor, cardiac MRI, and on Wednesday the 29th I go in for a cardiac catheterization. I've had one before, I'm not that worried about it, it's not a surgery, it's a procedure just like an xray or getting blood drawn are a procedure. Things are going good, and we're both confident in the doctors and confident that the results from the catheterzation will help figure out my headaches.

We got a hair clippers yesterday, and today I cut Mark's hair for the first time. I have never cut hair before, so I was a little nervous. He said if I screwed up too bad, he would just wear a hat. I wasn't sure how it was supposed to look, I took a couple big chunks out... Either way, he's happy with how it looks, so I couldn't have done it that bad, right? He says I'm a full-fledged wife now, and I am so glad it's only taken me 4 months to be full-fledged.

Mark likes his job, he has his own work vehicle he drives home each night and drives to his appointments out in boulder. It's nice that he gets his own work vehicle. He gets a work phone, a work PDA, a work GPS device, so now he knows where he's going. Work for me has been work. They just keep piling it on, and the thing is, I still get it done. I went to Omaha, Nebraska this past Tuesday for 2 job-site visits. That was... interesting.

And yesterday, I went against all my holiday morals, and bought Chirstmas decorations. It's not even Halloween yet!! I bought a tree-topper, some ornaments, and some lights, so we now have stuff to decorate our fisrt tree. The only reason I bought the stuff now is because each item was $6.00 or less, and the closer it gets to Christmas the sooner that stuff will disappear. So I figured it was a "buy now or forever hold your peace" so yeah, I bought Chirstmas decorations. But stuff only for the tree, and stuff we're going to keep around for a long while.

Anyways, we want everybody to know that we love you and are thinking of you, and we hope you all have a very Spooky Halloween!! Love always, bry and mark!! <3

Castles and Lobsters

Ok, so I know it's been longer than a week. Sorry, nothing really big has happened, it's just been tons of little things. From Mark going for his interviews, to getting the jobs offers and then making the decision. From grocery shopping, only to realize we really have no idea what to make in the way of meals for the week. The month of September is the "December" for the sales deptartment at work for the girl, so the sales guys are booking as many projects as they can this month, in other words, it has been absolute madness. I found out that Tom was so glad when I was hired because he had the job that I now have, coordination, as-builts, shop drawings, and helping the PM's out with random things like printing, and CAD questions. It's no big thing really, it's just that everything takes up so much time, and everything needs to be done by the "end of today", of course.

This past weekend was the 3 month mark for us. So we decided to get away from everything, get away from the apartment, shut the phones off, and head out. So Friday night we stayed at a hotel, Graystone Castle. It's just a Radisson, and it's just 15 minutes away, but it was enough "away" from everything to be perfect. (And it looks like a castle, so it was totally worth it!!) But it felt good to be "not home" - to not worry about the laundry, or the dishes, or the neighbors playing Rockband so loud I can play the guitar notes and get 87%, to not worry about little girls knocking on the front door doing fundraisers, to not worry about dogs barking at 5:30am, to not worry about anything!! It was so relaxing.

We bought goldfish for our snapping turtle, and we can't put them all in with him or they disappear within 5 minutes, and we also figured out, the goldfish aren't safe in the tank with the painted turtle, Ham&Cheese, well, neither are the little catfish for that matter. So we got a tank divider, and after figuring out the crayfish, Lefty, and Ham&Cheese could climb it, and they could climb it so much that BOTH got to the other side with the goldfish, I put it at an angle, hoping that would deter anymore scaling of the wall. We awoke this morning to a Lefty-less tank. (Lefty is about 6" long, and big enough that I call hima lobster.) I checked for intruders on the goldfish side of the tank, and didn't see him, but then I looked in the general part of the tank, and couldn't see him in there either. So we went on an apartment-wider lobster hunt. We checked the sink, the counter, the living room, and finally found Lefty under one of the armchairs. After the breakout, aluminum foil was installed to keep the critters IN the tank. So far so good.

At church, me and Mark are in the Primary, and of course, for the past few weeks, the kids have been practicing for the concert, lots of singing, LOTS of wiggles!! Well, being in Primary means we're out of touch with all the adults, and being new to the ward, means it hard for anyone to know your name, let alone, your phone number. Well, me and Mark both have Utah numbers still, and I keep writing mine down and handing it out, but it seems like everyweek, a new odd number for me pops up and no one can find my real number. It's pretty funny. But I think we'll get things figured out. Things are good and we enjoy the people in our ward!! :) Anyways, We'll eventually get things all sorted out and organized, right?

Love always - Bry and Mark <3

Attempting the impossible (baking and crafty-ness)

Ignore the table, look at the MUFFINS!!

So, I got a bug that gave me this urge to bake. So I've got recipes for Zucchini Bread, and I've got tons of new recipes for meal and stuff. That means that I've been getting pretty creative with meals, which isn't always as good as it should or sounds to be. So, the kitchen of my one bedroom apartment is full to the brim: with appliances up on top of our cupboards, and our cupboards are stuffed with food, no sense of organization, just jumbled and stuck where ever anything'll fit.

But there are still things I'm learning, like how much do I fill my muffin cups, how to start the grill, and how much of something to cook. Mark has this thing where he sometimes can't stand to see food still left in the pan at dinner time, I'm trying to tell him he CAN leave things for leftovers, so he can take them for lunch the next day...Some days he's better at remembering than others.

Well, and along with the baking bug - there's the crafty bug that I've somehow caught, as well. Vinyl lettering, scrapbooking, making my DVDs labels, I'm also planning on making my own jewelry (cheaper!!), preparing our CTR 6 class, and my visiting teaching lessons, and preparing family home evening stuff. Yeah it's been allot of fun thinking up new things to do. Now the only thing to do is: finish up my Thank You cards. (Pretty soon, I promise!)

Oh, and there is also finding places for all the "pets" Mark brings home. We've got little catfish, a snapping turtle and a painted turtle, a bunch of gamboosia (not sure how to spell it..), two crayfish, a bunch of North American Koi (goldfish), and now two betas. The betas are mine, I bought them to put in the vases I have from the wedding. (I put some "lucky" bamboo in each of the beta vases! It looks so cool!) We'll have to see if his next job introduces any more pets into our home...

So far it's been pretty exciting, and it really has been a blessing to be where we are, both in the journey of our lives, and spiritually. I know I for one look at things from a different point of view than I ever have, and it really is refreshing. I understand a whole lot more now, and even though we don't have children yet, I know where you're coming from mom! Thank you so much!! But We feel truly blessed to be where we are, in general.

Oh and we've also got a photobucket! (Adding photos to the blog is sometimes hard, so we'll post a few on the blog and the rest will be on photobuscket!) Here's the link: http://photobucket.com/Team_allcollard To check out our other albums, click one of the links on the left!!

All our love - always, Mark and Bry

Packer Game/Broncos Game

So, Mark went around telling friends he was going to the Broncos game, and his wife was going to the Packers game. But halfway thru the 1st quarter he leans over to me and says, "I think I'm just going to cheer. No team in particular, just say GO TEAM." I think the best part of the game for him was when Aaron Rodgers took off his helmet, and Mark discovered Rodgers' HANDLE-BAR MUSTACHE!! It was pretty funny. But the game was good, and it was alot of fun. I was telling the guys at work that I really didn't expect the Packers to win, but I was going anyways, cuz "ya gotta love da Pack, ya know?"

There were quite a few in Packers' colors, and even a surprising number of cheeseheads, I was impressed. But I figured it would be me, in green and gold, surrounded by orange and blue, and that's how it was. But what can you expect when you go to "their house"? I had on my newly made tie-dye green and yellow shirt, with "Rodgers is my homeboy" on the front, and GO PACK GO on the back. I also went sporting a green and yellow tie-dye towel I spun around when good things happened, and I had on green and yellow glow-bracelets, just cuz I can do what I want. :P

The game was a lot of fun, and we had pretty good seats too! We sat in the lower bowl, Row 29, Section 133, South-west corner of the field, and yes we were at the endzone where Rodgers dove over the linemen to make the touchdown and then spiked the ball, and also where Driver "dunked" the football, and where the Broncos almost caught a touchdown, but it BOUNCED off the guys numbers. The tickets we got were amazingly cheap too. :D

All in all, it was a pretty fun game. I only regret ONE thing, I forgot my camera, yeah, I'm amazing, I know. But it was pretty fun, and both me and Mark had a good time. GO PACKERS!!

Love always, mark and bry

Life in an apartment 101

Alright, so I figured it was about time that we post about this. DO NOT worry, everything is fine, and taken care of. Mark is in the process of making a "super-lock" for the door. Things are fine, we're fine. But here's the info anyways.

Date of event: Sunday, Aug 10, 2008

Me and Mark went to the temple yesterday, we bought the curtains for our bedroom (because the sunlight is blinding!!), and I finally figured out what I want to outline and dicuss in my lesson for Relief Society tomorrow. I took a nap, Mark was taking apart his new shotgun, and forgot to wake me up, so at 9:30pm, I woke up and started working on my lesson, oops. But I got it figured out and everything's fine. We read our scrpitures and went to bed.

At 2:15 am, Sunday morning, I wake up because this guy is pounding on our door. And I'm not talking "Hello, this is the pizza man" knocking on the door. I mean like, he was really mad or like we were in his house. I woke Mark up, and Mark went to the door, and started talking thru the door the guy on the other side, that this is our apartment, and his name is Mark. I called 911, told the officers that this guy was pounding on our door, and where we were at. Well, the guy pounding on the door was looking for some guy named Thomes, in apartment 6307. (We live in 4306.) I get done talking to the police, they're sending an officer over, and me and Mark go back in the bedroom and start to say a prayer. Half way thru our prayer, I hear the front door swing open. I look up and say, "Mark, they're in, they're in here!" He then walks out of the bedroom, and these people were in the apartment, pretty much all the way to the back by the bedroom. I call 911 again, cuz now they aren't just outside the door, they are in our apartment. Mark talks to them, and he figures out who they're looking for, and that they indeed are at the wrong apartment. No apologies, no "hey dude, I'm sorry about your door" no sorry about that. Well, the cops come, and pick up the drunk guys. (Yes they were drunk, they thought a 6 was a 7, and they just kicked in our door!) The door jamb and frame are in shreds, and the door doesn't lock anymore, they completely kicked it in. So we filed a police report, but are not pressing charges (If that changes, I'll repost).

But we find out today, from the maintainence guy that came to fix the door, that we have to pay for damages ourselves. So, like always, money is going to be tight for a while. But this is all a part of life I guess. And now you know why this was posted at a later date, I know it would have scared and shocked a few of you, and you would probably have been super stressed and worried about me and Mark. We love all of you, but we do know that we (your children) are reasonsible for your gray hairs, and we also don't want you to worry and stress about us too much. Especially when we're doing fine.

(Oh, and my lesson was about Establishing the Cause of Zion, and my end thought was how the home is a refuge from the wickedness of the world. How's that for irony?! I felt absolutlely sick to my stomache trying to go to bed last night. Mark stayed up until about 5:30 before he drifted off, I couldn't fall asleep, everytime I closed my eyes I had a picture of those guys coming back. But one thing I kept thinking about also, is that, 2 monthes ago, I was here all alone. What would have happened then? I am so very grateful for my husband, and how he really does protect and watch over me. I love him so very very much!!!)

Love love LOVE always, bry and mark

Starting off

Hi everybody!! I'm starting this to try to keep everybody posted on the goings-on of our life out here in Colorado. We're so far away from everybody and I think this is a good way to keep everybody in the loop, mom, dad, grandpa, grandma, brothers, sisters, friends and anybody else who may find themselves wondering, How are Bry and Mark doing? So... We'll post pictures and updates on what's going on with the jobs, life, and anything new that goes on. This is not an "out" to stop calling anybody, this is just a way to let everybody know how things are. If anything serious comes up, you can assure yourself, phone calls WILL be made, so don't think this is an excuse to not call. I, for one, feel I have to call home, and I know Mark feels the same. So again, this is not going to replace phone calls, this is just a sort of bulletin to keep friends and family in the know on whats happening. Technically, this could also be deemed as journaling, but we'll have to see.... :)



Hmm, so me and Mark have been out here in Colorado for just over a month now. We moved right on in, and we have stuff on top of the cupboards, out in the storage on the porch, out in the garage- our little one bedroom apartment is filled to the brim with all sorts of papers, plastic grocery bags, DVD's, video games, photos and wall hangings, towels, and all sorts of appliances. It is really nice, tho, I almost know where everythig is - Now it's just a matter of both, me and Mark, putting everything away in the same spot. (When we unload the dishwasher, we never put something away in the same spot, so we can never find it again!!)



My job has kept me busy, way busy, and I just had the mid-year appraisal meeting. I was nervous because I didn't know what to expect, and I've been noticing that the people I work with tend to focus on the bad things. But I passed the appraisal, and we set goals for Decemeber. My boss's have also been impressed with the progress I've made, and my accomplishments. I'm the youngest person in the CAD department, and the only girl. It's almost as if I inherited 10 older brothers. But they've realized they can't pick on me without getting cheek back, they call it attitude, I call it defense...

Mark pretty much got a job as soon as he moved here. He works for Colorado Mosquito Control. He drives to the shop here in Brighton, and then goes to "his area" out in Boulder. He's getting pretty familiar with the Boulder area, too bad everybody in Boulder is nuts! But he's been fishing out there a few times, and caught some good fish, he has to cook them up, because I don't know how to do it right. But he's also been catching pets for our empty fish tank. We had a toad, named Berry, for a few weeks a while ago, and we have just recently aquired a painted turtle name Ham & Cheese.

The bishop in our new ward didn't hesitate to get our records (he's been trying to get mine for 3 monthes now.) and we spoke 2 weeks ago. Also, they wasted NO time at all in giving us a calling. We are going to be teaching the CTR 7 class. Which is hopefully going to be a lot of fun, we're both excited about the calling. And as of next week, both me and Mark will have had the opportunity to have taught our auxillary classes. We're excited to have been welcomed into the ward like we have been, and it's quite a switch from our single's ward. But it's a very welcomed switch, we're grateful for it!

Love always, bry and mark