Since I am using this as a type of scrap book/journal, I want to post about our first year of marriage. Although we have been married only one year, it is already so fun to look back on our first vacation, first Christmas, etc.. There is something so special about all of it. Being married is sure an adventure, and I don't want to forget one moment of it. Although there are definitely trials and hard times (things aren't always a fairy tale), I wouldn't change any of it. This first year we have grown so much closer than I could have ever imagined because of our differences and the trials we experienced, overcame and conquered. I know our Once Upon a Time is just beginning...but here is the first chapter. :)
Our first official vacation together was our honeymoon in Mexico. We were south of Cancun, by the Mayan Riviera. We were on a beautiful resort right on the beach, Ocean Coral and Turquesa. We learned many lessons as a newly married couple....like how I am responsible for putting sunscreen on Shane, because if I don't my husband will be burnt to a crisp. haha. I learned that it is possible to spend too much time together, and that it gets old to lie on the beach or by the pool all day haha. With that being said, I also learned that Shane loves performances, yes even broadway plays. Every night at our resort, they had different shows. A disney show, rock of ages, a comedian. We both looked forward to those! However, our favorite part was definitely Chichen Itza! This is one of the seven wonders of the world....huge pyramids that have been around since before christ. They belonged to the Mayans, and this one below was their temple.
I will never forget how Shane would always try to talk down the prices with the locals that were selling souvenirs! (However, he would give in too fast, I think I was better at it;)
This long picture at the bottom was when we were able to swim in the underground cave! The water was freezing, but it was beautiful. Overall our honeymoon was an amazing experience!
I will never forget...when started driving home from the airport, we realized we had absolutely NO food in the fridge at our house. So we had to go grocery shopping at midnight at WalMart, and we didn't get home until 2 in the morning. It was pretty funny haha. Then that next day we went to the Derby in Nephi, which was our first "date" as a married couple. It was way fun.
One of the first things we did when we got home was open our hundreds of wedding presents! My parents came over along with my sisters and they helped me write down names as we opened them. I remember how hot it was in our no-air conditioned little old house. We rented from Shane's aunt Barbara, and the house was literally built in the 1800's. The kitchen cabinets were blue, the carpet was maroon and brown. But it was the first place we called home, and we loved it.
One of my good friends Britney got this shirt for our wedding, I loved it! You can see our lovely blue cabinets in the background.
I tried to be the best cook I could be as a newlywed!;) haha
Another very memorable experience in our first year was going to the BYU vs Utah game in September. I am a BYU fan and Shane is a huge Utah fan. What's funny is Brady and Tenille went with us. Brady is Shane's brother. He is a huge Utah fan too of course, but Tenille (Brady's wife) is a BYU fan like me! We always teased that the Blackett boys knew where the real cute girls came from;) We had a BLAST.
The coolest part was probably that Shane and I got to be on ESPN TV! ESPN was doing a special on "A House Divided". Families that were split BYU and Utah. haha. So a guy asked us if he could take our picture, and next thing you know we are getting texts from everyone back at home saying we were on TV! That was pretty cool.
Another fun thing we did around September-October, was sleepovers with all of our nieces and nephews! We had them all over at least twice, and took turns with Shane's family and my family. They were some CRAZY nights, the house was a mess with popcorn and toys all over, but it was some of the funnest nights we have had! The kids would draw pictures for us, one night (around Valentines day) I remember them all drawing pictures of me and Shane with hearts all around us haha. It was the cutest pictures ever! We sure had a lot of fun with them.
All the kids barely fit around our little dining room table! We cooked mac and cheese and stayed up late with these cute kiddos. I love them so much!
One of the most memorable experiences from our first year was being able to watch Shane coach. He is an amazing coach, and I can proudly say I went to every football and basketball game he had. I even went to most of the away games. Basketball was probably my favorite. I will never forget how cold the football games got! I remember sitting in the pouring rain, or freezing cold...but those were some of the most memorable times as well.
My nephew Jense loved to come and watch the games!
Juab VS Manti, FREEZING cold! But way fun, especially with my sister Necole there!
State Football in Cedar City! I got to hang out with Janelle and cute Griffin!
It's funny how the small and simple things really do create the best memories. Every game day, Shane would come home late at night and I would cook him a quesadilla. We would then sit and talk about the game. At least once a week we did that, especially during football season. That is one of my favorite memories from our first year.
I was so blessed to have the BEST class my second year of teaching, first year of marriage. I become close with many of them because I saw them at games, or Lisa taught them in dance.
Our big theme for the year is that we worked as a team! It really brought unity to our classroom, and I felt like they worked together better than any group I'd seen. It made the year go so much smoother!
It was pretty exciting (and weird) to be called Mrs. Blackett. My students had a hard time with it too. they kept calling me Ms. Penrod all the way up until the end of the year! But after a few months I got used to it!
I saw Madison, Veronica, and Mallory (who were all in my class) all the time because their sisters were on the drill team. I loved seeing them outside of school! They are the cutest little gals.
Jessica, Adi, and Brionna were also all in my class. Brionna would ask me everyday at recess, "Do you need help with anything Mrs. Blackett?" She was such a sweet girl!
During Red Ribbon Week one of the days was "wear your favorite jersey or team shirt". Trey, who was such an awesome student, made this! It made my day.
One of my best friends Katie got married in Bear Lake in October. I was a bridesmaid. I was terrified to drive by myself to Bear Lake, but I'm so happy I could be apart of her special day. It was very rewarding to see how happy she was!
Our first Halloween was a lot of fun! I don't know why, but I have always loved Halloween! I love dressing up, I love going to parties, I even love Halloween at school! (Many teachers don't). I absolutely love that I got Shane to dress up twice for our first Halloween together. I however, dressed up 3 separate times. :)
Loved decorating our little old house for Halloween!
Couples Halloween Party at Britney and Preston's house in St. George!
Pam and Michael from the Office, Kristin and Casey's Halloween Party
Carving Pumpkins! Love that smile of his haha
It was fun to see Leah and I had the same costume at school! I taught Leah my first year of teaching; this picture was during my second year of teaching.
Love the annual Halloween party with my family! Necole was pregnant with McKoy at the time:) Overall it was a great Halloween!
I also had an amazing 24th birthday!! I was completely spoiled by my Shane and my students!
I met up with my sisters and my mom for some Texas Roadhouse!
Shane surprised me with new Nike shoes, which I had really wanted and needed! I was so excited!
My wonderful class surprised me with a surprise birthday party! They got me the cutest cake with a castle on it (that was our theme) balloons, and tons of presents. Lisa came and delivered balloons and flowers from Shane!
We went to the opening night of the new Hunger Games movie! I actually went with my sisters, Shane and I went a different night.
Ever since marrying Shane, he got me completely hooked to CrossFit. I love it! We started doing a class twice a week, and we had a pretty good group of committed people that would come every week. It was a lot of fun. It was especially fun to have our nephews be apart of it. They loved it more than anyone!
Cooper and Brax loved flexing their muscles! :)
Yep....Shane did squats with me on his shoulders haha
CrossFit with the girls: Tenille, Jennie, me, and Hannah
So part of being married means you decide which holidays you spend with what family. Most people told me this was a hard part of marriage, because of course each person wants to be with their own family. Luckily, it wasn't that difficult for us. We decided to do an every other year type thing. And whoever we do Thanksgiving with that year, we do Christmas Eve with that year. We are lucky enough to spend Christmas with both families because we live so close to both of them:)
We spent our first Thanksgiving with the Blackett Family. We had a blast playing outside with the kiddos!
The day after Thanksgiving I got to go down with Shane and watch him play in their annual Turkey Bowl! This is a big tradition for Shane and his friends. It's a pretty big deal (hence the huge turkey trophy haha). I had so much fun cheering him on. They ended up winning 1st place!! The championship game got a little heated...the other team was pretty competitive. It sure was fun!
Towards the first of December 2013, Shane and I had the sweetest experience. I had a cute girl in my class named Hallie. We had become pretty close, and her mom volunteered in my class so we had talked a few times. Well one day Hallie came up to me looking a little bashful. She explained she had something really cool to share and asked if it was okay to tell me. I said of course! She explained that her family was getting sealed in the temple. I was SO excited and happy for her! Then she said that her parents allowed her and her siblings to each invite one person. She said she really wanted Shane and I to be the ones that came. It was the neatest experience I have EVER had, apart from my own sealing. The spirit was so strong as we watched three beautiful little girls in white get sealed to their parents. There was not a dry eye in that room. After that experience, I could never deny the truth that families are FOREVER!
Hallie and I in the long picture, and her cute family on the left. Such a beautiful day.
My favorite holiday is Christmas...so our first Christmas together was extra special. I got so excited to decorate the house and put up the Christmas tree! Being married during Christmas time just made everything twice as magical.
Our first tree!!
My friend Lyndsay made these adorable stockings! Lisa bought them from her and gave it to us as a Christmas present. They were so fun.
Our first Sweater party as a married couple! We got these sweaters from Shane's grandma Nadine. We had a fun time dressing up for Brady and Tenille's annual party!
Shane and I slept over Christmas Eve after our Penrod Christmas party! It was SO fun being able to do that our first Christmas, especially because it was at my house. Preston is the only kid left at home, so our parents were happy we could keep him company;) It is tradition in our house to lay out our stockings by the fireplace. It is a memory I cherish and definitely want to do it with our kids.
Love my three little nieces! Jaiden, Oaklee, and Kinsley on Christmas morning!
All the neices and nephews opening presents Christmas morning!
Hayden and Shane on Christmas morning!
Later Christmas day we go over to Lisa and Morris' house and their tradition is to do a nativity with the grandkids. Usually Brady, Cody, and Shane are the 3 wise men! I love how creative they get with their costumes. haha.
Our first New Year's together! Drinking sparkling cider of course.
Shane has definitely found out what a cheesy, lovie dovie girl I am. I love anything romantic and sappy. So he knew Valentines Day was a holiday I loved! As sappy as I am, he is the complete opposite. So I wasn't expecting much for Valentines Day...but I was completely surprised!
You can tell I love Valentines Day with the way I decorated the house!
Shane surprised me at my school with a beautiful rose and the cutest, most sweetest note I have ever read. That kind of stuff means more than anything to me, and he is the best husband for doing things like that for me!
Then he took me ice skating! Which I had been begging him to do for a while! We were both terrible at it, but had so much fun.
Towards the end of February, we found out that our cute little house we were in had been given a cash offer! Our Aunt Barbara couldn't pass up the offer, so we had just a couple weeks to move! Not coincidentally, we had been looking into building a house. We knew we were going to be in Nephi for quite a while, and buying a house we somewhat liked was more expensive than building. The more we prayed about it and thought it out, we decided that building a house was the right thing to do. So, we moved in with Morris and Lisa until our house was built! I am so blessed to have such amazing in laws who welcomed us into their home so easily.
Around this time of year was my favorite sport to watch Shane coach...basketball!! It was also his favorite sport to coach. We had a lot of fun! The most memorable game was probably when we beat South Sevier. They got in a fight the previous year in football with our freshman boys, and they were very cocky. So beating them was a sweet experience!
Coach Blackett making his game plan!
In February Shane and I were able to go to region drill. It is pretty fun having Shane's mom Lisa and his sister Marci be the drill coaches! It was a fun night because Juab won region!
Lisa, Marci, me, Savanna and Macy at Region Drill
Ok...really sad story. So my first year of teaching I got the cutest little mini turtles as a class pet for my students. I presented them to my the students on Valentines. They were so excited! We named them Giggles and Squirt. A year later, we were going to have a birthday party for them. The day before we did, Giggles died! My class was pretty sad and made this huge sign. Sadly, Squirt didn't last too much longer:(
One of my most favorite memories from this past year was definitely Shane's dancing moves! haha. Nobody would ever know it, but Shane is a dang good dancer. He would always bust out dancing moves, and it kind of became a game to whip out the camera and try to catch some of it. He got pretty good at noticing me start to record him and he would immediately stop. But here is one where I got him good! haha
Once March hit, there was only one thing on everyones' minds. March Madness! Every year all the Blackett's fill out their bracket. Unfortunately, I am clueless when it comes to sports, even basketball which happens to be my favorite. Last year I came in last place in the bracket competition...even against 4 year olds haha. But this year I happened to take first! I was pretty proud of myself ;) haha.
Easter was especially fun that year because I got Shane and I our very own Easter basket! It was ridiculous how excited I was to put them together haha.
Preston also got his mission call in April! That was exciting. He got called to Baltimore Maryland mission, which is really close to Logan's mission in New Jersey. He was set to leave July 16th, 2014.
I also got to have a fun girls trip with my friend Katie to Vegas. We have a friend that lived there (Sarah) who was about the move, so we thought we would go visit her. We went paint-balling! That was my first time doing that, and I got huge welts where I got hit haha but it was fun!
During Spring Break we had the whole week off! It was so fun to just relax and have lots of time to spend together! We hiked J hill; I love to hike so that was fun
We also helped his dad brand cows on the farm. I miss our farm in Genola (I never thought I would say that haha) so I actually really enjoying helping his dad on the farm whenever they need it.
Branding cows with my honey!
Towards the end of the year we had a lot of fun things going on. I have the best husband who came with me on two field trips! The kids loved and we had SO much fun.
The Living Planet Aquarium was a BLAST! The penguins were my favorite :)
Living Planet Aquarium!
Payson Pool end of year field trip...Shane even swam with the kids!
Spring Fling is one of my favorite Mona Elementary events! We did party rock anthem and had a blast.
Moving cows and going on a four wheeler ride!
Annual Dance Revue for Lisa's Dance Shoppe! We love going to this...mostly because we were engaged here a year earlier! :) May 9, 2013!
My student wrote me this fun stuff on the board! :)
Last day of school was kind of sad! I seriously loved this bunch of kids. They were all such good kids and worked so well together! I was sad to let them go. But what a great year we had!
