Lex and Levi

11/6/11

A Long Time Coming

Well, I apologize for how long it has taken for me to get pictures up here of our new house. We have been putting a ton of work into it, and it is finally to a point where it looks like home. So, without further delay, I now present to you the new Freckleton Residence:

These are the pictures I took on the day we first walked through it with our Realtor. Little did I know when I was taking these, they would be the first pictures of our home. I never got the chance to take better ones before we started working on it.

Formal Living Room

Family Room

Master Bedroom

Spare Room

Spare Bathroom

The first night we had keys, Levi and Taylor ripped up all the carpet, and Katie and I began patching up all the holes and we spent the next few days getting ready for paint:

One of the rooms had a million tiny push-pin holes

And then we spent nearly 4 weeks painting EVERYTHING! There were several times Levi and I believed we had taken on too much. It was a little overwhelming:

And then, the Friday before we were supposed to get our carpet in, Levi surprised me and had the carpet put in early. We were able to finally move into our home. Now we are onto the fun part of getting everything put in it's place. I think that will be a lifelong project:

Thanks to all our families for the hours they spent helping us. We couldn't have done it without you!

9/5/11

It's The Little Things

So, Levi and I have been going down to Phoenix almost every other weekend this summer, which has been so much fun. Last weekend, we were going down for a usual trip, which means we go to a Saturday night game, and a Sunday day-game. When we go on these trips, we usually leave early Saturday, like around 6ish, in order to get there for the evening game.

On Friday after I got home from work, Levi informed me that he wanted to leave earlier. Way earlier. Like midnight early. I was confused, so I asked, "Why so early??". His response was, "To avoid traffic...". There has been a lot of construction traffic lately, so I didn't question his reasoning too much.

...This story has a point...

I drove for the first half, which means it was about 6am when we traded in Page. I had been asleep for about an hour when I felt the car slowing down and turning. I think I have the drive down so memorized that just the feeling of the car turning a corner woke me up. I asked Levi where we were, he said Cameron. We never stop in Cameron, and I quickly realized why we were stopping there, and why Levi had wanted to leave so early. He was taking me to the Grand Canyon :) I had never been there before, so I was very excited. Unfortunately, I didn't think to bring my camera with me on this trip. I wish I had, but I will just keep the memory in my mind.

Thanks Levi for being so thoughtful and for being such a great husband. I have so much fun with you!

8/23/11

Hi Blogger!

Well, I think it is safe to say that I am the worst blogger EVER!! I could use the excuse that nothing exciting has been happening in our lives, but that would be a lie. This summer has been quite eventful, so much that I am afraid to leave something out! Here is a recap of our summer fun:

May:

Levi got a job at Market Star in Ogden where his step dad, Mike, and brother, Taylor, work. So, before the end of the school year for me, Levi moved up to Layton into his mom's house. After the school year ended, I joined him, and we have been living with them ever since! We decided rather than renting again, we are ready to buy a house. Mike and Lisa were kind enough to offer us a place to stay while we save up!

June:

Levi and I continued to take our trips down to Phoenix. We have really enjoyed the baseball and garlic fries! I started my summer job, and luckily the summer went fast, because I really didn't enjoy it!

July:

Levi went to the All Star Game with his dad and Taylor! They had a great time!

Also in July, Levi and I ran a half marathon! I had a great time, I'm not sure how much Levi enjoyed it. Levi took off as soon as the race started and left me behind, which was fine. The whole time, though, I was wishing we could somehow finish together. I didn't want him to have to wait for me to finish, so that was a big motivator for me to keep running. About 3 miles to the finish, guess who I see up ahead?! I was so excited to see Levi, and we ended up crossing the finish hand in hand at 2 hours and 45 min. I can't wait to run my next race!

August:

Well, Levi and I said we were going to wait until the new year to find a house, but when we met with a mortgage company, and they said we already had enough saved, we started looking! After about 2 weeks of looking, we think we've finally found the one. We've made an offer, and they accepted! So now we are just waiting on the closing process, which is quite tedious and annoying!

Also this month, I received a job offer from Salt Lake Head Start and today was my first day. It was all-day meetings and training, so nothing too fun, but I am looking forward to a new school year.

This past weekend, Levi and I took a trip out to Cheyenne to visit his sister, Jordyn, and her little family. We went down to Denver on Saturday to attend a Rockies game. Payton was so cute and funny. We love this little girl!

Bennet is such an adorable baby, and I'm sure he will be just as fun as Payton!

Those of you who know us well, Levi and I LOVE The Food Network. We watch serveral shows religiously, and most of the shows recorded on our dvr are from The Food Network. Well, one of our favorites is Challenge, and one of the stars of that show is Keegan Gerhard. He owns a restaurant in Denver called
DBar Desserts, so of course, we went. Much to our delight, when we arrived, we found out that Keegan was there! Before we left, he came out to meet us. He is such a nice guy, and we are so happy we went and that we got to meet him!

It has been a great summer!

5/3/11

A Fun Spring So Far

So Levi and I have been having alot of fun this spring. Here is an update because I'm sure you are all dying to know!!!

We have been attending quite a few cultural events, all of which have been very different, but very fun. It all started with the Bon Jovi concert, which was AWESOME!

The Man himself! It was a great show!

We also saw George Strait & Reba, and My Chemical Romance. Unfortunately, no pictures were taken at these shows. They were both awesome as well.

Levi's Mom and Stepdad bought a boat this past winter, and we took it out for a little test drive a few weeks ago. It was quite chilly, but made us all so excited for summer. Maybe I will finally get wakeboarding down...

Last but not least, we took a week off work and went on our first solo/week-long vacation together. We went down to Phoenix to enjoy some Diamondback's baseball and warm weather. We went to 7 games total, and it was so much fun! We ate hot dogs and garlic fries for dinner every night except for 1 (for Levi, 2 for me). Here are some highlights from the trip:

The All-Star Game is at Chase Field in Phoenix, where the D-Backs play, this summer. Levi is going with his Dad and Brother, and is quite excited.

This is the view from our seats. We had seats in this general area for the week, except for 1 night, we were a few sections over to the left. They were great seats, except for the day games when the sun was out. We watched batting practice everyday before the game and made fun of all the grown men with their mits, trying to catch a fly ball.

And what do you know...

One lands right by my feet and Levi finally gets his own fly ball!

I wanted a picture in my new D-Backs shirt Levi got me. Unfortunately, I had to wear a hat to the games to avoid the annoying wind! It is so windy in the stadium :(

Here are the Racing Legends!

Four guys wearing giant foam heads race around half the field after the 5th inning. They resemble past Diamondbacks Legends Luis Gonzales, Matt Williams, Mark Grace, and my favorite, Randy Johnson. It is hilarious to see, and I just love these guys. I would get so excited everytime they came out. You could also see them dancing with kids in the upper deck after the "7th Inning Stretch". It always put a smile on my face. One of the nights, they had a promotion giving away bobble-heads of "Racing Gracie" (Mark Grace).

I was yelling for Randy to come over, and he did! He also gave me a nice pose!

We ran into him later on that day, and I finally got my picture with him. A great way to end the trip!

Other events deserving honorable mention include:

-Laying out by the pool

-Going to movies in the middle of the afternoon

-Singing Katy Perry's new song "E.T" pretty much every time we were in the car

-Eating Waffle Dogs at Over Easy (if you ever go to Phoenix, eat there)

-The yummy pizza and beautiful surroundings at Pizzeria Bianco (eat here also!)

All in all, it's been a great spring so far!

4/23/11

26.2

Saturday was the big day! Levi and his friend Craig ran in the Salt Lake Marathon! It was an early morning, getting up at 4:00 a.m. They started running shortly after 7 a.m. The race started at The University of Utah and followed Foothill Dr. and dropped down to SugarHouse Park. They then went up to 2300 East and followed that to 6200 South! From there they followed Van Winkle Expressway to 500 East all the way to Liberty Park. They circled the park, and went up to 400 South and from there continued to The Gateway where Levi passed the finish line after 5 hours 48 minutes and 52 seconds! Way to go Levi! I am so proud of you!

Levi and Craig :)

Way to go guys!

3/20/11

Some New Events

So, it has been quite a while since I last postedon here. I guess I've just been waiting for things to accumulate so I could have more interesting things to write about than the contents of my menu and shopping list... :)

Levi and I have been making some nice changes and some big purchases to better our lives. We have been without a washer and dryer since we moved into our new place in August. We have been having to haul our dirty laundry with us up to Layton every weekend to wash it at Levi's Mom's house. We finally bought a new washer and dryer! Yay! I love them. They are so nice, and they are really pretty! Haha weird. There are so many fancy things that they can do that I feel like I need to pull the manual out all the time. I love to do the laundry!

Levi and I have also been playing around with the idea of buying a new car when my car got paid off since before Christmas. We paid my Alero off in January, which was so exciting. We thought we would probably wait a little while until we trade it in for a new one, but I have been nervous about being able to get out of it since it broke down in September. I didn't want it to really break on us, and not be able to sell it. Well, we found a 2007 Camry for a great price and after sleeping on it and discussing the pros and cons, we decided that getting into a Camry in this condition for the price we got it for was the smartest thing we could do. I love this car. It is so nice looking, and when I drive it, I feel like I look like a married woman who has a college degree. My old car was fun, and in it's day, was "super cute", but I had out grown it, and it was time to move on.

I have also found a summer job that I am very excited about. I am going to be working for a company in Holladay called SwimKids. I was hired on to help design a Summer Camp program, and when summer starts, I will be the lead teacher for the program. It will be nice to have something to do during the summer and to have something like this to put on my resume. The extra money will be nice as well!

This past weekend, Levi ran a half-marathon (about 13 miles) in Saratoga Springs! He finished in just over 2.5 hours, which is right where he thought he would be. He is training to run in the Salt Lake Marathon in April. I am so proud of him! Seriously, when I saw him in the horizon coming towards the finish line, I got a little emotional! I know that's not hard for me, but still, he rocks! Maybe next year we can run together! Haha...maybe. Levi says after the Salt lake Marathon, he won't be running anymore. I am still impressed by his motivation to accomplish this goal.