PAUL GOT A JOB!!!

needless to say, i am losing my mind i'm so excited. this has been our goal for almost 2 years! paul has been working in a warehouse at an electricial distribution place but he graduated in public relations, and has been working so hard to find a job as a copy writer ever since.

and we finally got one!! the place is called gcommerce solutions and it's located in park city (where sundance is, if you're not familiar) but we're going to live in salt lake and paul's gonna commute 30 minutes because park city is VERY expensive. and i'm definitely looking forward to living in salt lake. since i resigned myself a while ago to the fact that we were going to live and raise our family in utah (not that living in utah is bad, i just miss southern california a little still...), i vowed that i would at least live in my favorite place in utah - salt lake city. i'm by no means an ourdoorsy person so bigger cities are my cup of tea. AND, they have a huge farmer's market and loads of other craft fairs. and when anyone comes through utah, the only show they do seems to be in salt lake, and we'll get to see plays more, which i love, and there's such a larger variety of shopping (forever 21! yippeeee!) and of course, the main reason why we're so glad to move to salt lake: family and friends.

i can't tell you how many times we've driven down to the salt lake area to visit family and friends, probably once or twice a month ever since we've been married. and since logan is 2 hours away, we have to stay the night and bring all this crap (that's mostly for penny) and it's kind of tiring to always have to be spending the night with someone practically twice a month. but no more! we can actually visit someone and then - get this - drive back to our apartment the same night! and we'll have to bring no more than a diaper bag for penny! YES!

and man, i 've lived in logan for 7 1/2 years (including 4 years of college) and i am SO ready to be outta here. it's pretty and familiar, i know where everything is, and it's like the safest town in america but i am definitely ready for a change. both of us are. paul is so excited to be entering his chosen job field and to have an office job where he doesn't wear jeans and a sweatshirt to work.

and people can i just say, INSURANCE. we will all finally be covered with medical, dental and vision insurance and that is one of the biggest blessings out of the new job deal. paul hasn't been covered since we got married because we were students when we got married and had the student health center that was included in our tuition. when we decided to start a family, we just bought an individual select health policy for myself, because paul's job at the warehouse didn't offer insurance. big mistake. turns out because i bought the policy for only myself, and not myself and my husband, it was thereby not a family policy. so when it came time to add penny on when she was born, they denied her addition because paul was not previously on my plan. crazy, right? wait, it gets better. select health also wouldn't cover penny on an individual basis because she had "respiratory distress" upon being born and considered that a pre-existing condition. pre-existing condition?! she didn't exist until she had the "respiratory distress" and she didn't have the "respiratory distress" until she existed! FOR PETE'S SAKE!

so after much appealing and rejection and cursing select health to hades, we applied for medicaid for penny, and she's been covered by that since a few months ago. and that's great and all, but insurance through an employer is definitely preferable. insurance has really been a big source of stress in my life, not to mention worrying every day if paul gets hurt at his job and how we'd pay for it (we'll pretty much be paying for penny's hospital bills for the rest of our lives...thanks select health! you're the best!). so i am very relieved that our little family will finally be covered.

all of these huge blessings in our lives recently have been so amazing and i am so grateful for them. and i am so excited to be moving on and for a change!

so here's to the best early christmas present ever! NEW JOB!

thanksgiving weekend

my folks and little brother brian drove up from california to spend thanksgiving with us all at my aunt margo's home. she is an INSANELY good cook, so of course the food was amazing and we stuffed ourselves accordingly. thanks margo!

before we ate, we made apple cider! margo has this very cool machine where you toss the apples in a grinder on the top and then press the juice out of the mushed up apple bits on the bottom. sooo good.


doing a bit of apple juggling.


my dad doing the honors and my uncle jim with his daughter aubrey.


my grandma balmforth (my dad's mom) playing with penny. i love the pic on the right - they both look so happy!


the whole balmforth clan.


the larsen fam and my brother's wife kjersti with the always adorable katelyn.


feeling victorious after a little black friday shopping. i got so many clothes for penny at half price it was rediculous.


and last but not least, penny and max in the tub. aw, little tub buddies.


(and i took paul to see new moon...and he liked it! yaaaay.)

new moon!

*some spoilers...

i loved it! i saw it with my sister lana this weekend and i can't wait to go see it again with paul this week!

i don't care what the critics say - it was so fun to watch! besides, 1) do you ever notice how the critics mention "i haven't read the books but..." well, DUH. people are only seeing the movies BECAUSE of the books. they don't understand that the books are immensely popular on their own because people love the story and the characters and the movie is just a visual representation of that. and 2) most movie critics are dudes.

how it was better than the first one:
- better hair, makeup, clothing etc. the vampires' eye contacts were so much more vibrant! their white makeup didn't look so chalky and their hair color looked better even though some of their wigs looked kinda fake. alice was so beautiful! her clothes were tons better and her hair wasn't all flipped out like in the first one.

- special effects. i thought the wolves looked pretty good and were horse-sized like in the book. the vampires running was so much better, too. blurry-too-fast-to-see running is infinitely better than stationary-torso-creepy-sped-up-legs running. edward sparkling in the sun was fantastic! it really did look like diamond faceted skin. so awesome. it really shows what a bigger movie budget can buy.
- bella didn't blink her eyes and bite her lips 5 million times like she does in the first one. i thought kristen stewart was more natural in this one.

things i loved:
- the volturi! i loved their BRIGHT red eyes and their tower in italy was perfect. marcus and caius were so perfectly cast but aro was awesome! he was so crazy and perfect with his creepily calm voice. and i loved how dakota fanning looked as jane. "this may hurt just a little..."

- jasper! his flip-out scene at the birthday party was awesome and i loved at the end when they were voting and he said "it'd be nice to not want to kill you all the time." ha! i'm looking forward to his backstory in "eclipse."
- - mike! oh my crap, he was funny. after bella comes to sit with them for the first time in forever, mike is all "glad to see you're eating...gotta get some protein in there" as he pokes her, it's not funny just reading it but how he says is so funny. i love bella's human friends in forks.
- face punch! that fake movie title is hilarious and i loved the dialogue you heard while they were watching: "if you don't put down your gun, i'm gonna punch you in the face! if you BOTH don't put down YOUR guns, i'm gonna punch YOU both in YOUR faces!" ha.
- jacob vs mike! wasn't it so funny how they were sitting on either side of bella with their hands palm up on the armrests? i'm so glad they put that scene in.
- victoria's flaming hair! sooo much prettier than in twilight. (but how come she didn't talk?...)
- and hello, abs much? jacob looked so cut and buff that it looked fake. rediculous.
- the volturi and edward, bella and alice standing in the elevator with generic elevator music in the background. yeah, i imagine that would be a little awkward and tense.
- bella's visions of edward. genius! not only does she hear him like in the book, but she sees him too reprimanding her.

her cliff-dive was cool and i liked how they were side-by-side in the water. and oooh, didn't victoria look scary swimming towards her in the water?
- seeing a glimpse of bella as a vampire! their clothing looked kinda cheesey but seeing them run together and all sparkly was so cute! makes me excited for "breaking dawn"...if they ever announce that they're making it.
- the soundtrack! paul bought it for me before the movie came out and it's really so good. every song was composed or mixed differently specifically for the movie.
- i just thought the whole movie flowed really well and that chris weitz was really faithful to the fans and the book. yay!

things i didn't like:
- um, did anyone notice that edward's nipples looked weird when he took off his shirt in italy? okay movie people, so you can cgi some sparkles onto his skin but you can't color-correct his nipples? that's great. (by the way, did you know edward's abs were painted on? ha. guess taylor lautner beat ya on that one rpatz).
- edward's pink lipstick in the beginning.
- the wolf pack actors were kinda stiff.
- person kicking my chair behind me during the whole movie. i mean, COME ON. how can you be an adult and kick someone's chair for 2 hours and be okay with it? SO RUDE.
- being sad that victoria would be a different actress in "eclipse."
- um, i really can't think of anything else...i just loved it the whole time!

things i still didn't like carried over from the first one:
- rosalie. ha. was it just me or did she have SO MUCH makeup on and her wig was so fake-looking that she kinda looked like a transvestite? oooh, that's mean, i'm sorry. but she really had it caked on more than the rest of them.
- missing out on parts i loved from the book. i know they have to fit it into a 2-hour movie but don't you just wish they could make a 6-hour mini series of each movie? too much? okay, well maybe not 6 hours...but i would've liked to have seen edward and bella on the plane coming back from italy, the cullen reunion in the airport, bella ripping the radio out of her truck after the cullens have left...the list could go on.

i'd love to hear what you guys thought of new moon!

TWO MORE DAYS!

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee (breath) eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

this girl loves to read.

yeah, i know she's not really reading but i love that if you offer her a book or a toy, 90% of the time she grabs the book. i wish i had a video of it (because i think everything she does is cute) because she LOVES to turn the pages. i'll just sit with her in my lap and hold the book for her and BAM BAM BAM she'll turn those pages like it's her job.

the middle picture is my favorite. it just kills me how cute she looks holding up that book.
(sorry the pictures are kinda fuzzy, maybe one day i'll get a real camera).

25!

this saturday i turned the ol' two-five and had a great low-key birthday. paul got me these cute flowers, made me breakfast and got me the 5th season of the office! booyeah. it was nice - we just slept in, relaxed all day in our jammies and then went out to eat at an awesome little italian restaurant called le nonne. can i just say that i am in love with this card paul made me?

my little brother derek came over to baby-sit so we could go to dinner and he was so sweet and made me not one, but TWO mix cds with this awesome cover:

thanks buddy!


paul got me the teeniest cake - i loved it!


thanks for a great birthday paul!

we came. we canned. we conquered.

(thanks lana for letting me steal this pic from your blog because i was too lazy to bring my camera.)

our aunt margo graciously invited us balmforth sisters to come over and can some applesauce from their homegrown apples. i had never done it before but was kinda excited. it was pretty fun! see that narly looking machine with apple guts coming out from that funnel tube? i don't know what it's called but you put the boiled applies in the top and it mushes the fruit part out into that green bowl and spits out the skins, seeds and stems at the same time. WHOA - this is high-tech canning. we had a good time domesticizing and margo let us keep a dozen jars of applesauce! which i will feed to penny if paul doesn't eat it all first. (and margo also gave us jars of her homemade salsa, spaghetti sauce and peach-raspberry jam. i tell you, this woman we call aunt margo is crazy-talented! my food storage thanks you, as does paul's stomach.)

yes, i'm mormon. yes, i live in utah. and yes, i canned.

must...not...succumb...to...ratting my hair...