The Rockwoods: February 2011

There have currently been a few small obsessions in my life. Pinterest, cooking, and DIY.

First of all, Pinterest. Stephanie Berglind this is for you! Chase and I were telling your mom about this and she said we should tell you as well. It's called pinterest.com. It is a website where people pin interesting and wonderful things that inspire them. There are categories such as fashion, home, DIY, etc. It blows my mind, and my wonderful husband has been quite patient with my current obsession. He's actually even gotten a little interested. This brings me into one of the other current obsessions: DIY

Using pinterest has sparked quite the fountain of creativity in my soul. I have found many, many knew things I am planning on doing in our home. I will definitely be blogging about any home beautifying business. BUT last weekend, on one of our weekly DI raids I found a wonderful lamp. It had a nasty flower painted on it, but has really neat metal work on the top and base. $9 people. I've since painted it a dusty blue and have been playing with a few different lamp shade ideas. Before and After pictures are soon to come (once i finalize the lamp shade). I've also got a project lined up for this weekend involving toilet paper rolls! I'm just giving a little sneak preview to keep you on the edge of your seat. Also, I've got a stenciling idea for the walls that Chase and I are both pretty excited about. Plus... Lots and lots of homemade chalkboard paint. Alright, that's enough of the sneak preview.

Now on to my third obsession: cooking. We purchased a Bountiful Basket last weekend and I've had the opportunity to discover some wonderful new recipes and even make up some of my own! Who knew. Taking pictures always seems like the good idea that i never remember until we're done eating. Perhaps I'll start taking pictures and posting recipes.. good idea? Recipe swap my fellow chefs? I think yes.

Now on to other current events.

Nursing: I will find out tomorrow if I made it into the program for spring.
Bittersweet? Yes.
Why? I've been playing around with the idea of changing majors to feed my creative side. College is suppose to be about chasing your dreams and doing what you really enjoy. It's the time is your life that's really suppose to be devoted to you and your goals. I would like to enjoy it. Right? Although, I've come to the conclusion that if I do get in, I will do it. In addition to it though, I will take some beginning photography classes. I know all of you family would love to have a photographer in the family. Ali the nurse/photographer. It would be worth it just to be able to take beautiful pictures of our children. I know that i have the ability to do well in it, and even if I just have the basic I think I could rock it. At least Chase has faith in me. That's all I've needed.

So, that's what I've got to look forward to tomorrow. The determining factor for my future is currently resting at the post office.

But how could i forget?! WINCO TOMORROW.

Chase and I have recently implemented a strict budget to our lives using mint.com. We have been almost all out of groceries for about a week and the start of a new month means that we get to make a trip to Winco tomorrow. I am literally dancing for joy.

Also, we had the amazing experience of having a missionary lesson in our home yesterday with our African friend Abraham. If you don't know the story behind Abraham perhaps I will do another post regarding him. In short, he came here a couple weeks into the semester and we were able to have him live in the boys' house that we manage. He is Pentecostal, but his family wanted him to be at a school with high standards. He is from Ghana and has the most irresistible laugh. We held a missionary lessons in our home yesterday. He asked so many amazing questions about prayer, how to receive answers from God, and most of all what make his religion so different from ours. We were able to bear testimony of the truthfulness of the Spirit, answer to prayer, and the priesthood. We felt the spirit so strong; I fought tears the entire time. At the end of the lesson we asked him to prayer for us. Never in my life have I heard such a pure prayer. It was as though it had come from a man with great knowledge of the gospel. The spirit was working through him, and he was able to feel of it and recognize it. My heart was so full that I honestly can't find words to express it. We are so blessed to have received Abraham in our life, and been given this opportunity to share this gospel with him. He was asked to commit to be baptized in April. I loved his answer: "I will need to pray about this."

I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is the true church. I know that God lives, he knows us personally, and he answers prayers. He brought Abraham to us when we were in search of missionary experiences. I hope in turn that we can be an answer for Abraham.

Our next lesson with him is on Friday! OH ALSO JULIE B. BECK CAME HERE ON SATURDAY.

I love you all, and hope all is going well. I'll post more soon. What an awesome week.

So obviously I've been a little behind lately on blogging... but I decided i needed to make time for it today and do a long awaited post. So here's the deal.. our house that we are managing was bought by the Hemmings, which own the Pines, the Cedars, and the other houses on this block. We were the last one. So, they bought our house and then a month or so later they had some managers that got an internship last minute, and they had to leave in 3 days. So, own owner asked us if we'd like to take on a little more responsibility, and get a bigger place. Of course we said YES! We now manage our boys house, and three others of married housing. We now feel like we have a home. Which will make it hard if we have to move back into an apartment type place. We are only guaranteed to live here until April, but they are going to make a decision of whether or not they are going to tear down all these houses and build a new complex, or leave them up. We're praying pretty hard that they'll leave them up! I mean.. we have so much room we could have kids here. It would be so nice to be able to stay until we graduate at least. Plus if they don't tear the houses down, we will paint! (Which i want to do in the kitchen and bathroom especially!) We have been incredibly blessed by our Heavenly Father with this new home and finding such good buys on furniture and everything. We are just in awe everyday of the many blessings we have been given, and we're just trying to live so that we're worthy of these great blessings. Also we're both working wonderful jobs on campus. Chase is back at the special collections office in the library and I am working in the admissions office as a processor of high school transcripts. BUT no more waiting!!! Here's a video of our house! And the debut of my hair cut that i never showed.. don't worry. It's only 2 months later haha! Anyway. Enjoy! I'll also post some pictures back from Christmas and whatnot! Love you guys!