Yes my friends, mid 20's

There has been so much going on lately I feel I don't have time to write it down. And when I do have time to write it down I'm too exhausted to do so. Where shall I start? Well, Joseph and I celebrated my birthday by playing miniature golf. Haven't played that since I think I was pregnant with miss Ella. It was fun but usually I beat Joseph and love to rub it in his face b/c he's a big golfer but this time, I didn't get to do that. He totally beat me! We also played some arcade games like air hockey, ski ball, deal or no deal, and this one that I thought was pretty cool it was like this virtual reality roller coaster. Kinda fun (by kinda I mean it was entertaining but I wouldn't beg to go on it again or anything) We went out to our regular date night treat place, Golden Spoon. (love it) My birthday was on Monday and yes my friends, I am now well into my mid 20's. Oh man. 26. I'm officially starting to be afraid of my birthday. We spent my birthday with my family. Ella was SO excited that it was her mommy's birthday that she's still talking about it. Joseph and my brother Noah made a pretty sweet birthday cake. It was the infamous strawberry shortcake (infamous b/c that's the cake I've had every year since my 16th birthday party) but this time they stacked two angel food cake bunts on top of each other so they were pretty big. It was a fun birthday and I'm glad I had family to spend it with.

In other news, we've been so busy here b/c Joseph and I decided to stay in Mesa all through school. So last minute Joseph signed up for classes at MCC to finish up his associates degree. After finishing, he'll transfer to ASU and finish up his bachelors. We're hoping that staying here and becoming AZ residents and going to Arizona schools will help him get into dental school here in AZ. (feel free to tell me your thoughts and opinions on this Maggie, Brooks, and Steph) We've also met a lot of people here who are dentists and Joseph has talked to them about job shadowing them. On top of that Joseph has been getting job interviews lined up with companies that will help pay for college tuition. All this week he'll be going to interviews and then on Monday he'll start school. Today we had a great opportunity to interview with the high council of one of the stakes out here that has 4 baseball fields they need a grounds keeper for. The ball fields are directly in the church's "backyard" as well as a house for us to live in. We would get to live in the house totally free! Free rent, electric, gas, water, sewage, internet, ect. Seriously the biggest blessing that has crossed our paths! There were 3 other guys interviewing for the job so we're really saying our prayers they pick us (we totally wouldn't mind if you all said prayers for us too ;) to take care of everything. Living in my parent's house has it's perks but it is a 3 bedroom house with my parents, our little family of 4, and my two brothers. It's a little limited on space. I can't find anything bad about having this living situation at the church. The girls would have 40 acres at their disposal, Joseph would have unlimited use of basketball courts, there are picnic tables (unfortunately no playground) and SO much room to run around. Not to mention the fact that there are 3 bedrooms so Carly could finally be out of our room! The guy who just quit the job said that they lived there for 4 years and were able to save up $50,000! and just bought a home. That is something we would definitely benefit from! Anyway, we REALLY want this job. We'll find out in a few days if we get it. I'll keep everyone posted.

I ventured out to make friends for Ella and me. It's been so sad, Ella keeps asking to go "home" and for her friends. I tell her that we are home and live at Nonie and Pop's house and she says, "No, MY home. My home in Las VAAAAgas". So I decided to use my new hobby of card making to make some cute invitations to invite her whole nursery class (about 15 2 year olds) over for a pool party and popsicles so that Ella AND I could make new friends. Well I worked so hard on the invitations and gave them out 1 1/2 weeks in advance so everyone would have enough time to plan for it. The day of the party I got Ella all hyped up. She woke us up at like 6 am with her swim suite on! She waited so patiently all morning for 10 am to come and for her friends to show up. Anytime she heard a noise she'd run to the door with her hand cupped to her ear saying, "I hear sumptin! My Fwends!!" And can you believe it... NOBODY showed up! I think I was just as upset as she was. (probably more) I couldn't believe that not one person showed up, not even so much as a phone call! I know that it's hard to talk to new people but there are 2 girls in our ward that I know of who look about my age and each have a 2 year old and a 7 month old baby. So what they heck??? I know I should probably step up and say hi but for some reason my body just won't let me do it. My brain says go and my body says no. It makes it even harder that nobody showed up to the pool party b/c I take that kinda thing personally. It's stupid but I do. That's another reason I want to get this job at the ball fields so that we can move and start all over in a new ward.

Oh, and one more thing...I totally forgot to tell you all this. Joseph and I are training to run our very first 1/2 marathon! I owe this all to Monica and Alissa! Thanks for helping me get motivated. I've been pretraining for the past month and am now running about 4 miles Mon, Wed, Thu, and Sat. This week it gets bumped up to 5! Holy smokes! (Monica, remember when I couldn't stop puking and going to the bathroom just after a 2 mile jaunt with you! ha ha) I can't believe by the end of this I'll be running 13.1 miles! Nuts I tell ya! I decided one day that I need to set some goals in my life so I can say that I've had lots of accomplishments. I decided to start with this. There are some more but we'll get into those later.