Highlights from our First Year of Marriage!

Here are all of my favorite memories from our first year of marriage...it was quite an incredible year!

Our honeymoon in Sunriver, OR was amazing. We can't wait to go back. That was the most relaxing week we've ever had. 

You can read the posts about our honeymoon here, here & here.

In October we hosted our First Annual Fall Feast Family Fun Day. I'm already planning for this year's party! I'm going to be sending out the invites soon so that everyone can plan ahead :)

(I miss my long hair...I can't wait until it's long like this again)

We cut down our first Christmas Tree! .... I cut down our first Christmas Tree ; ) Matt's going to do it this year and I'm going to cheer him on while sipping some hot cocoa ; )

We went with Matt's family to see "Cinderella" in the city :)

We survived "Snowmageddon". We spent days in our apartment. Luckily we were one of the few families with electricity. Cogsy loves the snow!

Matt surprised me on Valentine's Day with flowers, dinner and chocolates! Mmm!

We spent an amazing weekend in Vancouver, B.C.! 

We spent LOTS of time with our little dancers :)

Matt took me to Forks for my 24th birthday on our way to Seabrook, WA!

We found a new favorite getaway location in Seabrook!

We went hiking :)

And we opened a dance studio!

It's been a fun and exciting year together. I can't believe it's already been a whole year. We also get to celebrate our 4th Anniversary while we're on the cruise. 

I'm so in love with Matt. He's my best friend in the whole world and can't wait for our next year spent together :) I feel so lucky that I get to be married to my best friend. I wonder what our highlights will be this year........

-Chelsea- 

Countdown to Our First Anniversary!

We are so excited to be celebrating our First Anniversary on Sunday!

I cannot believe how fast this year went.

Matt's sister, Mel, is getting married on our anniversary and it will be and has been fun to relive it all over again :) It's kind of neat that we get to walk down an aisle together again and on our anniversary. 

We have learned so much about one another this year and I love that I am still (after 4 years) learning new things about Matt everyday. This has been a big year for us with a lot of new and exciting changes. Hopefully with lots more in our 2nd year of marriage! I am so excited for our future together. Tonight Matt made dinner and we ate at the kitchen table together. We turned the TV off and just talked. We never do that. We are always eating on the couch. I loved it so much! I hope this will become a new habit for us. We talked about how excited we are for our cruise that we board on Monday. I'm most excited for the food & shows and Matt's most excited for everything :)

Also for running to the front of the ship and screaming "Iceberg straight ahead"...because well....there will be...

We have been getting a few videos emailed to us from our videographer. Small clips of our wedding. The video isn't done yet because he let us pay late so it was one less expense in the time leading up to our big day :)

I thought it would be fun to post one each day leading up to our anniversary. 

So...here is the first one!

We are so incredibly happy with the way these highlight videos are turning out and we can't wait to see the whole thing! 

Just 4 days until September 2nd :)

-Chelsea-

Surprise Night in Suncadia!

Yesterday was my last day of full-day dance camps for the summer.

Matt's parents are spending the weekend in Suncadia and invited us to come down for the night to hang out since it's just an hour away. 

I was in the middle of my camp kids putting on a musical (literally, mid-show) and Matt came up to me and said, "how much longer is the show? I made plans and have a surprise."

Say what?! I am always the one making plans. How cool!! 

After the show, Matt didn't tell me until we got in the car where we were going and I was so excited!

I went home and grabbed my swim suit and shaved my legs as fast as humanly possible and we were off. We got there and immediately we felt like we were in Sunriver again. *sigh* so relaxing!

We went swimming with Matt's parents, took a nice little walk and then they took us to dinner. It was a beautiful restaurant with some amazing mountain views next to us. Matt had steak and I had the best meal I've had in a really really long time. BBQ chicken and macaroni and cheese....deep fried...then dipped in honey! Holy yum! My mouth is watering writing about it. I want to make mac and cheese with honey. Never would have thought about that but it was so delicious. 

{to think this is just one hour from our front door...}

{the kids, before dinner/after swimming}

{mom & dad}

It was so nice of them to have us over during their vacation and to take us to dinner. 

It was such a surprise night and was so nice after the crazy summer I've had. : ) 

Matt and I can't wait to take a trip there. We are so pumped that it's just an hour from our house...literally! 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today we've played tennis, went to the outlets to window shop for the cruise, visited Snoqualmie Falls and have a mean Yahtzee tournament going (I'm champion 2 for 2). We're making burgers now and then we're going to have a Kinect Sports battle. Maybe I can get Matt to play Dance Central with me too ; )
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I never blogged about it, but I have some cute pictures. A few weekends ago we went to the zoo for Marie's company picnic. It was a lot of fun!

{elephants are my favorite animal}

{it was fun to see the kids, we don't get to see them much anymore}

Just 15 days until we get to board our Disney Cruise! And 1 month until Whistler!

Exciting stuff :)

-Chelsea-

Great Friends!

Today was great.

Sadly, I have no pictures because there was no opportune time today to whip out my iPhone for a photo. But, today is still worth writing about because we loved it. 

We made breakfast together this morning (I love when we cook together).

Had a jam session with singing and amazing dance moves (by Matt) in the bathroom while getting ready. Mostly to our new favorite song, "Some Nights" by Fun. 

We met with Alex and Matt at the Issaquah Farmers Market so they could get a new experience in Issaquah. Alex will now be 2nd in command at the studio and I have never felt better or been more excited about a decision for our business. After the market we all went to lunch at Coho and then got to show them the studio for the first time. They just moved here from St. Louis and I cannot wait for my team girls to meet her on Monday! We had such a great time with them. Matt and Matt got along really well too. I think we will be great friends :)

After hanging with them we came home and chilled for a couple hours and then got to head over to Chris & Katie's for dinner. We love any time spent with them and tonight was just another one of those, "I love you, you're my best friend" nights. I could talk to Katie about anything and everything and will always be having a great time. It was also fun to see that Avery has learned to clap and it's pretty darn cute :) After dinner their neighbors came over and we learned some new board games from them. I want to play them both again. One was hilarious, "Snorta" and one was just plain fun, "Tsuro". 

We enjoyed some yummy mojitos made by Chris (I love mojitos!), and Katie made yummy sausage/onion sandwiches with corn on the cob. Mmmm Mmmm Mm! 

We couldn't believe that we hung out with two sets of friends in one day.

We loved it so so much!

I cannot imagine us anywhere else than where we live right now...

Life is good.

I actually heard this quote in one of my new favorite Justin Bieber songs, "The grass ain't always greener on the other side, it's green where  you water it..." and now I found this on Pinterest.
We have definitely been watering the lawn, and it's beautiful :)

Tomorrow will be another happy day....cleaning, tennis & Matt's parents are coming over for dinner to watch the Closing Ceremonies. Can you believe they are basically over already?! Whoa!

Time to go read "Kingdom Keepers"...Matt's got me hooked and our plan is to read the 5th one together on the cruise...I've got some catching up to do. {Kingdom Keepers are a pre-teen/teen chapter book series about what happens at Walt Disney World after hours..} Ha, we love them so SO much!

-Chelsea-

This Week.

Hardest camp of the summer.

Lots of "interesting" personalities with this group that are not quite working out. 

Today I had to split them in two groups...kids who will dance & kids who prefer to sit out on the side, cry all day or like to yell at me and other children. Yikes. 

Matt is convinced we will be the best parents ever one day, simply from making it through the past 3 days. Punishment this week has been..."Now you have to go sit with Mr. Matt while we play games!"

*side note: we fully realize instructing a summer dance camp is not the same as parenting.*

24 days until our First Anniversary (wow that went fast!) and 25 until we leave for our Alaskan Disney Cruise! Matt has been doing his research and I am certain we will have an amazing time every second of those 7 days. 

Just 12 more camp days. 2 of those being full dance days (9-4). 5 being preparing a group of 23 kids for a musical in just 5 days (I love a good musical!). 5 days just half days with 4-6 year olds playing Pirates and Princesses all morning. 

It's safe to say...I got this! 

Monday night after practice we went out and played tennis again :) We had to take the night off last night because my arm and wrist hurt too much...and tonight we took off because I just can't get off the couch. I want to go play again tomorrow night after practice though. We found some awesome courts in our neighborhood with lights so we can play late and we have so much fun. I want it to get warm again so we can go swimming again.

I don't have anything too exciting to blog about lately, but I like writing.

I haven't been making it up late enough to watch the Olympics...sad :( I've been so tired this summer!

I fell asleep the other night sitting up in bed with my journal in my lap and a pen in my hand. Matt said he took the pen from my hand and put my journal away and my hand never moved and I never woke up. He also said I've been grinding my teeth at night more than ever...I'm ready for summer to be over. Never ever will I have to be this stressed out again. 

Well wait...never ever will I have to teach this many hours ever again. 

It's just too much. 

I'm going to go have a glass of wine...

-Chelsea-

Today Rocked!

I know I wrote this morning already, but today is one for the books.

Today was nothing extraordinary. It was just an all around, good day.

We were productive and had fun from the time we woke up and we're still having fun now at 9:30pm.

Chilled in bed then decided to take Cogs for a walk. Cogsy was so happy :)

Walked around our whole neighborhood.

Costco for samples (all the samples!) and hot dogs :)

Ate yummy burgers for dinner and I finished watching Bridesmaids while Matt did homework.

We watched Matt's favorite rollercoaster show :)

We went out and played tennis. We've never done that together before and we loved it!!

Then...got home and decided to go swimming at our pool which we've also never done together. We were like little kids. We had contests, he was Phelps and I was Lochte lol. We also had contests who could do the best flips under water. (Matt won because I have to plug my nose lol). Matt also tried to teach me how to go under without plugging my nose...I failed...panicked when it went up my nose...didn't try again. Ha. We'll have to just go again. Matt also gave me rides around the pool on his back holding my legs pulling me around. Ha! It makes me giggle thinking how much fun it was to just be silly. 

Best part, Matt wanted to do it all too.

I could cry it made me so happy.

Best. Day. Ever.

And, it was nothing special.

We spent a whole $5.00 today and paid in change. (One of those days) We made it awesome! I told Matt I wish we just had change everyday...he told me "let's not push it..." lol. 

August is going to be the best if we keep having days like today! Matt started this morning off by reminding me that we don't need money when we're so lucky we have each other. Soon, very soon, things will be so good. In the meantime...he made today rock. I just loved it so so much. He just kept wanting to do stuff and I did not disagree! 

I hope this is the start of a great week. My favorite camp this week..'Shake it Up Dance Camp" Hip Hop camp! :) I'm ready!!

Now time to go watch some Olympics and eat popcorn with Matt!

Oh hahaha and we discovered something today....Matt's going bald!! (Don't worry, he thinks it's funny too) : ) I already warned him that this must be documented. 

Hehe!

-Chelsea-

Sunday Social:: Dreaming of Fall!

It has been so long since I have done a blog link-up and now that fall is just around the corner (my absolute favorite season) I really wanted to jump in on this one.

Before I start, I need to write about today.

Matt and I are having the most productive day!

We stayed up late last night watching "Bridesmaids" on Matt's iPad in bed and I thought for sure I wouldn't wake up until 11am today (I'm good at that). Nope...we were both up by 9am and out of the door to go on a nice long walk with Cogsy around our neighborhood by 10am. We loved it and Cogsy loved it. That's two walks in two days Yay :) 

Then we came home, and got some major work done! 

Sent out an email announcing the studio to every single family I've ever taught. 1,000 emails just went out and I'm hoping that means people will start registering for September :) I needed Matt's help on that and he helped me without me even having to nudge him about it. *sigh*

Then it was Costco for lunch, checked the PO Box (nothing--*sigh*) and grabbed our tennis rackets out of the storage unit. 

I'm so excited!!! After dinner we're going to play tennis together. We've wanted to do this for so long and today Matt asked me and I jumped on it! He has re-jumpstarted his want to win this diet bet and I love his new found motivation, makes me the happiest wife in the whole universe! 

Now.....onto my awesome blog all about my favorite thing ever....(except for Matt, dance & babies)....FALL!! 

What is your favorite fall activity?

When I think of Fall, I think of how amazing it is where we live. It's so freakin' beautiful here in the Fall. I also think of three things...college football, Ben Franklin & Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Lattes. Eeee I'm getting so excited for September. It makes me giddy! When Fall starts, Matt lets me go to Ben Franklin as much as I want and I craft away like a mad woman. (He loves that he gets to watch football without me bugging him). AND, I get to make a bajillion crafts. I also love cooking in the Fall. We're going to get fat. Bring on the chili and cornbread!! I also love pumpkin picking, our Issaquah Salmon Days Festival and parade which my girls will be in this year, Halloween & our party and Thanksgiving. YAy!!! We're so close now. 

Do you follow a football team, if so which one and why?

Well...I am a Packers fan. My Dad would kill me if I didn't say that. So, NFL...Packers, college football Matt would kill me if I didn't say Cal. Even though I know absolutely nothing about either really. We have agreed our kids will be brought up liking the same. Matt doesn't care about NFL really. Just college football. I do love hanging out with his family during football season though. Last year I learned a little bit more. Maybe this year I'll finally get it and can pay attention through a whole game. Hmm...yeah, probably not. I just like making crafts. YAY..I am seriously on a weird high because I'm so happy writing about this lol.

What is something fun about fall in your area?

Salmon Days Festival! Parade and the streets are filled with vendors. Lots of crafts and art and fun stuff. I love it so much! This year I would also like to go pumpkin picking and apple picking. And just taking walks here in the fall is the best. I love Seattle in the fall. We live in such a beautiful place. 

What are you favorite fall outfit staples?

I love scarves, boots, long sweaters & leggings. I love carmel colored riding boots and my black riding boots. I wish I could start wearing that now!  

What things are you looking forward to most about this coming fall season?

Hmmm....lots! Pumpkin Spice Lattes & our Alaskan Disney Cruise start it off, followed by the grand opening of our studio (actually those happen at the same time...I'm missing the first week of classes but have it fully covered). Then Whistler and Marie is taking me to an amazing spa....Eeee!!! And we're going zip lining!! I'm excited for our 2nd Annual Fall Feast Family Fun Day. I am looking forward to celebrating Thanksgiving at Mel & Clint's new house and helping her cook everything. And, I'm excited about getting a car!! (finally!)

(Honda CR-V)

(Ketchikan, Alaska)

(Scandinave Spa, Whistler)

What is your favorite fall holiday? Traditions?

Halloween for sure! I love pumpkin carving. I love eating anything pumpkin. Pumpkin bread, pumpkin spice lattes, pumpkin seeds, pumpkin muffins....mmmm! I eat pumpkin bread at Starbucks year 'round. I love our Fall Feast Family Fun Day and am excited about having our friends Chris & Katie come this time and also one of our new instructors and her husband, Alex & Matt. I love cooking for everyone :) 

We're grilling some yummy burgers tonight that we got from this month's meal swap. I'm going to grill them on our griddle. :) 

Happy Sunday!

Just Some Thoughts.

This summer has been the hardest summer of my entire life.

I have never ever worked this hard before and...I have never ever been this stressed before...or felt so much riding on my shoulders before. I have never before in my life felt so tight financially yet okay at the same time (making good choices). I have never before in my life been more exhausted. Never. Not ever. 

This summer has been amazing! I have learned so so much!

I would not trade any of that stress, exhaustion or worry for anything. Never, not ever.

Just one more month and things will fall into place. Just one more month of wondering.

Just one more month until our preschool program starts back up and we are okay. One more month until our studio is up and running.

Just one more month until all of our classes in all 11 of our locations are up and running.

Just one..more..month!

I can do this. I got this! (I think.)

Tonight I learned a lesson.

I cannot make everyone happy.

I had to make a difficult phone call, one I was dreading because I knew it would cause conflict.

I made the call. They were not happy and my response..."I cannot make you happy. I am doing all I can to make things run smoothly but it is just impossible right now for that to be." I said it and, I accepted that. And, I was okay 100% with saying that. I know, I will never make everyone happy. Not everyone will be in love with my teaching style or how I am running my business. But...the other 800 families I have right now are happy and I reminded myself of that throughout my entire conversation and I felt a calm over me because of it.

I got off the phone...walked out into the living room where I knew Matt heard the conversation.

Usually he has advice as to how I should handle those situations for the next time (very frustrating) having his Disney management experience he definitely knows how to deal with difficult situations.

But.....He said, "I listened to that entire situation and I could not have been more proud of you. You are growing up right in front of me." and he kissed me on the forehead. Then....I let all the tears I held in for the entire phone call listening to a woman tell me how my program is so awful...out. I have not cried yet this summer.

I am dancing everyday from 9-4pm and then two days a week I coach afterwards until 7:30pm. I. Am. Exhausted. But...haven't cried.

My iPad was stolen last week and I didn't cry.

I told myself it is just a "toy" and is easily replaceable. Yes, expensive...but we already have another one along with many other Apple gadgets. It did belong to our business so we will be getting another one as that was our "cash register", but we will be okay. It was okay. It is okay. 

My number one goal this month is to remain calm...take deep breaths and focus only on the positives.

That is the only way I will make it through this summer. 

This summer of working 60+ hours/week paying myself just about well...as much as I can (sometimes not at all). 

One more month, one more month, one more month!

I have never been more excited about payday in my whole life. 

September 1st will be the best day ever. The day I can breathe again! 

I love my job and can never imagine doing anything else. But with it, there comes working with families every single day. I am in charge of all the finances for a company that started as a teeny tiny one to now one that actually does well. I am the choreographer, lesson planner, coach, instructor, manager, costume maker, everything lady. Yikes. BUT...it's what I've always wanted.

Is it hard work...yes. Is it worth it when I go to a community event (today) and had a least 10 kids run up to me for hugs...definitely! Wouldn't trade it for anything ever! 

I thought Disney was awesome getting hugs from so many cute kids all day...that was when they had no idea who I was. Now, having kids come up to me for hugs because they love me...now that's the best thing ever! 

There are so many times throughout my summer camp days where I am so frustrated with the kids, but there are at least 10x's more times where they are cracking me up or making me so proud with what they are learning and accomplishing this summer. 

I had to vent. I'm doing my best to not let this affect me tonight and to not let it make me stressed. I'm doing all I can to de-stress. Nothing is going to ruin this calm I have going on lately. 

I feel better now...time to go watch so Men's Gymnastics (Matt's got it paused this entire time I've been writing...oooops). {best husband ever}

-Chelsea-