if your happy and you know it

Wow, I cannot believe that it is already February! This year is already flying by.. Curtis birthday is Saturday and then Valentines Day is on Tuesday! ... exciting!!
The past few weeks we have done some fun things, and also relaxed alot because we both have been sick. no fun. Curtis is still sick so we have been taking it easy.
It has been cold here but no snow here. It snowed, or I should say Iced, here a few weeks ago but that is it.
Curtis is doing Two internships (he is very busy) and I am still working. Luckily our work building are really close to each other and we work at the same time. What a coincidence!
So here are some pictures of fun things we have done lately.
Curtis planned a day date for us to go to China town, I think it was two Saturdays ago. On Jan 28. After we walked and ate there, we went to the Portrait museum and that was pretty neat! Had a big variety of art things.

pretty sure people thought i was weird when i took this pic... lol

outside one of the chinese restaurants they make things like noodles right in front of you!

These were our Freaky Fortunes. Curtis is at the top and mine was at the bottom. CREEEPY.... it knows us well..lol

These pictures are in the very middle of the inside of the National Portrait Gallery. It was like an atrium with the building surrounding you...and the roof was awesome!

These were like waterfalls but the water just flowed evenly on the entire rectangle. They could be like little reflection pools if people weren't playing on them. The kids were having a good time... and so was Curtis. lol

Some scultpures

This picture was Pocahontas, it really is, too bad you can't see her face... lol

An amazing grand piano that i loved. 

My role model!! hahah (L cool J ... Laura cool Jenkins..)

We wanted to do cool poses by this amazing painting of LL cool J but there were people standing around watching us so we couldn't flash any gang signs. ;) haha

This art was really neat. It was the US outlined in lights then inside every state there were tv's that had videos going on representing each state. Like for Kansas they had Wizard of Oz playing. In Utah they just had, what looked like, a video of someone driving through Utah Dessert on a road trip or something. Not too exciting. haha

On our walk back to our car (which was pretty far away I might add) we decided to just have fun. We found all sorts of things...

My cute Lion

random art sculpture or something? 

So you can't really tell, but the sunset was SO beautiful. The colors in the sky were pink, purple, blue, orange... pictures never do them justice. 

We also went to The Whitehouse and went on a tour of it this last Saturday on the 4th. We were pretty excited. To go on a whitehouse tour you have to get it approved through your state legistlative and everything so you have it plan it a ways in advance. They don't let you take any pictures of the inside so we unfortunately don't have any of those. But we do have pictures of the outside! haha
Here are a couple from this last Saturday.

 The inside of the whitehouse was pretty amazing. We saw a couple of rooms but they were so extravagant and had so much history behind everything in each of the rooms. Each of the rooms had a name too ie: red room, green room, oval room... nothing crazy, but it was really neat!


Also, my mom sent me this picture. My cute nephew Ryan was baptized on Dec 24! Its been a little bit now, but its just so exciting! Congrats Ry, we are so proud of you!

Ryan, Jeff (my bro), and Kaleb

That concludes the pictures that I have. We also went to a fun superbowl party that our friends threw. It was a fun time, with Amazing food that they made from scratch and it all looked so pretty! ... I still keep thinking about the delicious red velvet cake they had... mmm 

I am so sad that I didn't take any pictures. Some of them did so I will have to try to track those down to post them. 

love you all!

then comes the sun

changes. sometimes I really dread the word.. but other times, I welcome it with open arms. changes can be difficult to adjust to. It seems like my life has been drastically changing for the past few months. Marriage, moving, etc etc.. Lots of people go through it. Although all these changes have been and are taking place, I have loved being able to learn and grow with Curtis and go through these changes with him.  We do both like to argue that we have not been married before so we don't know how things normally go... lol Its all about making adjustments.
What has been difficult for me is to see my family and friends back home going through their changes (life doesn't freeze when you leave.. weird, i know.. lol). Its hard being so far away and not being able to do much for them. I want to be supportive and/or there for them, but its hard for me to figure out how I can do that.
I've been finding out some changes that are going on with my family back home and its been hard because to me, they seem like pretty big things, but there is not much I can do all the way over here. I don't know why I am really writing about this, maybe i just need to vent.
On the happy side of things, we have a new nephew that is due on May 1st! Also, so many other exciting things are going on and we wish we could be there to be there in all of that greatness.
One thing that happened to me, which I am not happy about, is that my videographer from my wedding lost ALL of the reception footage and when i say lost, it was all deleted is what he had said. I was crushed. I was SO excited to see the video from that night because everything was such a blur that I wanted to be able to relive it over and over with the videos. (I love to watch things over again... especially because it was such a special night ;).. who wouldn't want to remember their wedding reception, right?) Anyways, I had saved up my own money to pay this guy because to me the wedding video was one of my main priorities.. (of the usual wedding worldliness) and now I don't have that. Also, the guy won't respond back to me so i probably won't even get my money refunded. I am so disappointed. I thought he was someone I could trust, especially in this situation since it was his fault and everything. It isn't very honest and it makes me sad that he won't even do that. Yeah, I know I am probably being silly about this. Especially since there are so many great things that we have to remember our wedding. :) I am grateful for that.
At least we have pictures and at least I got to marry my best friend.
He has helped me so much with all of these things going on that I think Heavenly Father knew what I needed!
Change is all about the way you look look at things.
While the things in my family were going on I was choosing to see them from a scared perspective. I didn't want the changes to happen. The more I have reflected upon them I have seen the good that can come from them.
There is a quote that I love which says; No matter how dark the night gets, the sun will always rise the next day.
Now if you are reading this, I hope you don't think that I am unhappy. I am SO happy. Its hard to see ones you love going through changes without you there. That is the point I was trying to make.
Also, I just wanted to vent because i've had alot on my mind.
I am grateful for people's examples to me. I am learning so much about life and the twists and turns it may take. If it weren't for the twists and turns or the 'changes' then how would we grow? We wouldn't.

I am Grateful For:
*Curtis, he is such a good example to me and I learn so much from him
*My Family and my New Willardson Family
*My friends
*Our apartment
*our ward
*our jobs
*food
*our sweet little ford focus, or what curtis likes to call, the Micro Machine.