525,600 Minutes

How do you measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets...

In midnights, in cups of coffee...

In inches, in miles...

In laughter, in strife...

In 525600 minutes, how do you measure a year in the life?

How about love?

Measure in love.

-sons

Sea-

of

love.

525,600 minutes...

525 thousand moments so dear...

525,600 minutes...

How do you measure, measure a year?

It's time now to sing out, though the journey never ends...

Let's celebrate, remember a year in the life of friends...

Remember the love...

Measure in love...

Seasons

of

love...

Seasons

of

love...

Measure

in 

love

Happy Anniversary to us! Here's to another year where we love like crazy.

Day 4: Joyful

We went to my Aunt's house for her little guy's birthday. We played with balloons, laughed with family, and ate pizza and cake. Life is joyful when celebrating with family. And when blowing out candles. 

Days like this remind me that no matter how bad you may feel, family can always lift your spirits if you let them. No one can love you as much as family loves you. That's a huge part of Christmas for me. Love, which goes in harmony with family.

Love family and birthday parties like crazy!

Recapturing Beauty Day 8: making peace with my genes

I'm ok with my genes. Since being in biology, I now have a fascination with genes. It's crazy to think that out of more than a billion different combinations of alleles, I got the ones I did. And I wouldn't have it any other way!

Who do you think I look most like?

Got a pretty good mix I think. I definatly know I got my dad's blue eyes. The dark kind that can be greyish depending on what I wear. I think 2 of the 5 kids actually got my mom's light blue eyes. 

Someone once told me that I look like my grandma miller (my dad's mother). These are some pictures of her when she was my age. What a classic beauty! (She still is!)

Can you see the resemblance? I still can't get over how awesome these pictures are. 

I hope to research more about my family traits on both sides of the family. It puts a different spin on doing genealogy! If I had more than just a day for this challenge, I would have gathered more pictures for this post! Oh well.

I love my family and my genes like crazy! 

Recapturing Beauty Day 6: Making peace with food

Happy Sunday! Isn't it a great day? I get to go to church and feel so relaxed afterwards... And then remember that I still have a challenge to do!

The challenge today was to appreciate food and enjoy eating. The basis for the idea is a scripture from Doctrine and Covenants: "yea, all things which come of the earth... Are made for the benefit and the use of man, both to please the eye and to gladden the heart; Yea, for food and for raiment, for taste and for smell, to strengthen the body and to enliven the soul" (D&C 59:18-19)

I love food. Is it just me, or isn't it awesome when you can come home and make your house smell awesome with the food you make? Isn't it amazing how a little piece if chocolate can release endorphins in our brains and prevent us from being super cranky? Isn't it wonderful when you can just grab a fresh apple and take a crisp, sweet, bite? Food is incredible.

I have a respect for chefs who are masters at creating a dish from regular ingredients we all usually have.  I wish I could be that good at creating meals. I'm pretty good at finding Pinterest recipes, though. Personally, I probably eat a little on the unhealthy side, but I also enjoy fruits and veggies and hope to one day have a garden. It balances out right? So far, my abilities enable me to grow some awesome cilantro, which has made Mexican dishes so much more authentic tasting. :) I was going to snap a picture of it, and then I realized that I needed to water it! So scratch that ability to take care of plants; These poor things are barely hanging on!

Since I've gotten married, I feel like cooking became a huge deal to me. It wasn't because I felt like it was my duty as a homemaker, but more because I wanted to make me and my husband happy and healthy. Cooking for someone other than yourself changes everything. I'm building a repertoire of meals that my little family likes. Realizing this has made me take more pride in my cooking and I'm getting better every day. We're finding things that each of us is good at, like Austin is king at making smoothies, tea, apple anything, oatmeal, spicy dishes, CHEESECAKE... A lot of things. I'm the one who can make toast and grilled cheese without burning it, soups, fried rice, pies... And I'm sure there's more but I can't think of any. 

Today we had Pumpkin Hamburger soup for lunch cause I had TONS of leftovers. Then we preceded to eat chocolate pie. Don't regret it at all! It was very delicious... Even if I kinda ate a good portion of it. 

We then ate dinner with Austin's family at an aunt's house. I see eating as a great experience when there is good food and good company.

That's not ours, in case you're wondering. We love holding babies. We also love the fact that we can give them back if anything goes wrong. ;)

God is great. Food is good. And I love family like crazy! (Can you guess that country song?)

Recapturing Beauty Day 5: Making peace with exercise

Today's challenge was to do an activity that we enjoyed doing. The idea is that we get out of the mindset that exercise is a chore or an obligation because we feel guilty about food we eat. We should do activities that bring us joy and make us feel happy. My favorite quote for this is "Exercise gives you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don't shoot their husbands." (Legally Blonde)

I thought about this and even asked my husband why he exercises, just to get a guys perspective. He does it because he likes the way he feels afterwards and he doesn't get sick when he exercises regularly. I think that's a good reason. I can tell that he loves the activities he gets to participate in.

I'm not the kind of person who feels comfortable in a gym. Mostly because I don't know how to use the equipment. My mamma, on the other hand, rocks her workouts. A lot of her reasoning is to stay healthy (not a bad reason) but she also really enjoys it. She's inspiring to me. 

I do love dancing. And anything that involves water or the ocean. So, I'm super active in the summer... And get a little depressed during winter because being outside is FREEZING and miserable. In my post yesterday, I did mention I'll be getting back into dancing and I'm really excited for that. 

Today, I spent all day with Austin's family that's in town so I didn't get to do my activity for the day until late. Like I've said before though, family is always more important. 

My activity: Yoga.

Bonus: Austin is joining me.

This is seriously the only picture I could get documenting that he was with me. You people are lucky you got one. ;)

At first we were going to do a P90x yoga routine because I'm crazy. Then it became too late and we settled for a more relaxing yoga session that wasn't as long. We will so the P90x yoga one of these days! It'll happen. You'll see.

I love yoga like crazy! And sleep. It's time for some of that good stuff.