Chi town second anniversary.

So we decided to go to a movie a couple weeks ago and since the only one we could afford was the 10 AM show we woke up early and caught the train by our house. We rode up into the city and went and saw  inception. We both liked it but the coolest part of the trip was before the movie. While we were walking to the theater we ended up right in the middle of filming for transformers III . They had all the bridges we needed to cross closed and were shooting a helicopter scene.  It was really neat to see.

 After the movie we walked around a touristy part of the city called Navy Pier and took the train home.
For our anniversary we bought nose bleed seats to SHREK the musical. I was so excited.  When we were a block away from the theater a lady stopped us and offered us awesome seats that were much more expensive than the ones we bought.  Her date cancelled and she didn't want to go anymore.  We were so excited and The musical was awesome! We got in trouble for taking pictures inside.... our flash was off... she said no flash photography not no photography. Anyway It was a wonderful 2nd year anniversary. I can't believe it has been two years already! So much has happened in such a short period of time. I would say these have been my best two years so far.

We got Brett some golf clubs and he improved his golf game, This is the side of the golf course. 

The walls in our apartment are basically concrete and it is so hard trying to hang anything on them, we have went through many nails before just giving up. So I wanted to do something for my wall.

My toilet paper roll art.  I cut up toilet paper rolls, glued them together and then spray painted them. This is a super light weight piece of art so it was easy to tape up on the wall.

A day with Tori's family at the Science and Industry museum. 

I will post more pics when I can get them uploaded. hope you like the update!

Chicago Apt video

Here is our Chicago Apartment.  We want to put more decorations up but the walls are pretty tough!

4.0

I got a 4.0 summer semester at Weber State I am pretty happy about that!

A couple more semesters and I am a college grad!!!! awesome!!!!

Really we got a new car...

How weird that I was joking about getting a new car last post and now we actually had to get one.
So on Thursday July 29th I had just finished getting ready for the day and was about to start the last part of packing for the move to Chicago. My family was driving across country to help with the move and were going to arrive that night. Brett had left for his rotation about 20 minutes earlier and the phone rang.... it was pretty early so I wondered what was up. Brett just said KELL..... my heart sank, the way he said it I knew something was wrong. Well a lady had the sun in her eyes and made a crazy left handed turn into on coming traffic which happened to be Brett.

He wasn't hurt to bad. He had burns and blisters on his arms from the airbags but other than that he was ok.  So Brandon our friend was so nice to pick me up and we went to find Brett. The car was really crushed on the passenger side corner. The ladies car looked worse than ours. The big bummer was that we had been working hard to pay the car off and we were about a payment away from our goal.

 We found out that day that the car was totaled and we would need to buy another car. The ladies' insurance paid for our rental and that is what we drove to Chicago in. Later I mean way later that night my family made it safely to our place. I was SO SO happy to see them. Family just makes everything better!  It was good to get hugs and kisses from them!  We all went to bed.  The next day we packed the Uhaul and then had some fun in Atlanta. We went to the aquarium and then the national museum of patriotism. We had dinner at Steak and shake, one of our favorites in Atlanta.  
 It was a long day   and we hit the sack early because we woke up at 2:30 in order to get on the road at 3:00 am. We met the Hobels at a gas station near the freeway and the trek began.

We made it to Chicago by about 4:00.  We had lots of help moving in because we had the Westbrooke and the Adamow couples waiting for us. Krista made a delicious lasagna that everyone loved and it was so nice to have a yummy dinner after the long day of driving. My family stayed in Chicago with us only for a day and then they had to make their way back to Utah.  I was so sad to see them go!

the next day we test drove some of the cars we had been researching online. We knew more about the cars than the dealer... we had studied the car fax and compared prices from a lot of places. one car had hit a deer and the sales guy had no idea until we showed him the grill and explained why it was cracked... funny.   I am grateful for my education and this day it really came in handy. Because of my contract and negotiations class I was able to get the dealer down about 3,500.00  on the price of the car we wanted. I wouldn't have known what to do with out taking that class.

We drove our 2010 Hyundai Elantra off the lot that night. Because we had our other car almost paid off we were able to put a good chunk of money down on this one and because we did well negotiating the price and warranty we basically stole the car...   Also because we are from Utah they used Utah's sales tax instead of the almost 10% here in Chicago. One of the guys working with us looked up the details and told us they only made a couple hundred off the car. that made me happy!!!

The car is AWESOME!!! lots of room, nice interior, ipod hookups, shiny and new!!!

Chicago has been so fun so far!
We have tons of trails and parks by our house. We live one block from Lake Michigan and have beaches all over the place. Our ward is good, lots of people like us there. The university of Chicago is close by so there are quit a bit of student families.

Brett says the thing he likes most about Chicago is everything and I have to agree. We are happy here... Don't quote me but I can see us staying here a while....

We will see...

New Hair! New Car! New Home!

So we have been in Atlanta for nearly 3 months now. I have been so busy with my school work and haven't had much time to blog.... sorry. We have had a great time in Atlanta as well as some wierd and not so great times but the last two weeks may have been the best of them all!
On July 7th Brett asked me out on a date... we went to the fork and screen movie theater and saw Eclipse... Brett cheers for Jacob... It was a fun date. The next day the 8th Tori took me to a salon here in Atlanta and we both wacked our hair off... That was really fun! A new hair cut/style is always fun and different. I was proud of myself for actually doing it... usually I get too scared.
The next day Brett and I hop in the car and he starts driving, I have the map but have no idea where we are going... Finally after about an hour Brett hands me an envelope with my name on it... I open it up and he had made me some coupons for a new pair of shoes and a hat. He had looked up some outlet malls about a hour north of here and we had a blast walking around! I got an awesome pair of bright green nike running shoes and a really cute black hat!
Pretty great birthday huh? Well it doesn't end there. the next day July 10th my real birthday Brett surprises me with a day at 6 flags!!! We had a blast! we rode pretty much everything!
That night we had dinner at Benihanas!
We were so pooped that night!
Then this last weekend we went on a road trip to Myrtle Beach South Carolina! Our Friends John and Amy Potter live there with their darling baby girl Emily. We hadn't met Amy and Emily yet and had so much fun getting to know them over the weekend! Myrtle Beach was really a cool place! There was so much to see and do, it's one of those places you need a few weeks to get everything in. We went to the beach twice. Brett lost his glasses from the big waves. Myrtle Beach really reminded me a lot of the Bahamas. It really made me miss our scooter! We went to a pioneer day celebration with the Potters and then had an early dinner at a really cool restauraunt which was kinda like Benihannas only with better tasting food! yes it's possible! It was just fun hanging out with John, Amy and Emily. She is the best baby. She never cried just giggled a lot. The drive there and home was really fun too! We listened to all our favorite music and made it through some crazy rain storms!
Brett isn't liking his rotation much. I think a lot of it has to do with the doctor he is working with. He is just a shmuck... I won't say more cause I will get upset.
but Bretts rotation and Atlanta will all be over in 10 days.
We took the car to get serviced, they gave us a really nice loaner car and it was fun pretending it really was our new car for the day. It was so hard to give it back!!! So no we didn't get a new car just used one for a day
We are moving on the 31st we are so excited and anxious to see what Chicago has in store for us!
I will post pics of all this soon!

our apartment

Here it is! all our stuff is here and in it's place!

We went to church today. Our ward is cool, even though it's the same church everywhere the people are sure more welcoming outside of Utah. It's nice and kind of sad...

our apartment and Atlanta

We are settled in Atlanta. We really like it here. The other day we wanted to go see iron man 2 and so we looked on the iphone for the cheapest one. We found one called the fork and screen. It was so cool it was an actual dining movie experience. You were seated at a table and waited on before the movie. There was a button to push if we needed anything. We ordered dinner and ate durring the show. It was so cool.

Last night Brett and I went to a place called five points here in Atlanta. What five points was in the olden days was a town where the railroad was causing trouble and a mess for the towns people. So what they decided to do about the mess and trouble following the railroad was built their city up above the railroad leaving the trains mess and trouble underground. Now it is used as an underground mall. There are all kinds of shops and things to do underground there. I found this cool original gas lamp that had a hole in the base from the civil war. There were all kinds of things down under where the trains used to be. Old cars. malt shops, newer stores... It was a fun experience. Today Brett took me to where he has his rotation. After that we went to this place called the steak n shake. Which may be our new all time favorite place to eat. ( in the fast food category) There shakes where awesome. I would say even better than Burger Bar back home... Well we still have lots to do and see, we are planning on going to a braves game and going to the worlds largest aquarium too! It's cool to be here seeing all this stuff! I am glad we have this oportunity.