things like...

today I woke up feeling extra grateful, not just in general but specifically for certain things. things like-- my husband who works harder than anyone I know. he gives his all, 24-7 in everything he does. i feel so much of his love through that, and it makes me love him that much more. as well as the sweet notes he leaves on the door before he leaves to work.things like-- the sunshine when I haven't felt it in months, even when its scorching hot on my black jeans. things like-- my job that i love more than any other job i've had. and not only that, while i've worked there I have found the greatest friends i've ever had in my life. they give me compliments that sometimes i don't feel like i deserve, but they remind me of who i am becoming. things like-- my family and the way we love each other, care for each other, and pray for one another. things like-- an education that i can gain and learn from every day that pushes me to find myself and my capabilities. things like-- heart aches. aching for other people and their struggles in life. things like-- the ability to love and feel it grow. things like-- the holy ghost who protects my thoughts, words, body, and choices. things like-- moments of stress that allow me to find control and peace within myself even when i just want to freak out and throw my hands in the air and say "i'm done". things like-- my physical strength and healthy body that allows me to exercise and build my self-confidence and motivation.

every single piece of this life that God has given me, is what makes me who i am. is what makes me happy. i love Him so much, for the loving Father in Heaven that He is. 

the best day

watch our video HERE!! 

we got our wedding video back!! ah i'm in love. april 17, 2015 was seriously the most happy, perfect day. love, love, love my hunty. 

thank you Collette Cinema for capturing our day so lovely! 

pondering on the temple

Hunter & I have had the opportunity to go and attend 2 sealings in the past week. One for my little sister, and one for our best friends. It has been such a good reminder, although we haven't been married long, of the covenants we made together and the promises that were sealed upon us. During one of the sealings i whispered to Hunter that we need to make a goal to attend the temple at least twice a month. We both agreed with the desire to do better, together. Living out of Utah where there isn't multiple temples within 30 minutes of us is much different. Not impossible, but i see now how life can become such a distraction when we need to make time for the most important opportunities. 

I love this quote, that is such a powerful promise. There are so many blessings awaiting us. We must always make God the center of our marriages and our lives. We just need to make the time and effort to accept them into our lives. We have been told to go OFTEN and go REGULARLY. Its for our benefit and happiness. I truly believe that. 

I love the comparison of the temple and our bodies. How we treat the temple should reflect how we treat our bodies. With respect and cleanliness. We should feel the same feelings we feel in the temple within our spirits. Just as the temple is a place we go for answers and peace, so should our bodies and souls be a place we can go for pondering and peace. The spirit cannot dwell in unholy temples, so we must strive to be worthy and ready to receive the spirit within our own spirits. 

This is something that the sealer said and hunter reminded us of when he bore his testimony the following sunday -- if we keep the covenants and promises we made at the alter when we were sealed...we WILL be exalted.  

 The promises we are given really are PRICELESS. I hope Hunter & I can be better and make more of an effort to remember the covenants we have made and attend the temple more often.

cupcake

you know those days when you just feel not so good about yourself but your trying really hard to be optimistic but something small is just eating at you, bothering you and making you feel "off"?

okay maybe i'm just crazy. 

BUT. those of you who have felt like this...please enter my day today of that kind of feeling. i started my new job as a nanny to the most adorable twin girls (such a huge blessing for us) and i was so excited to start! everything went so well there. but i didn't feel my full self all day. i had to run to Sams on the way home to use a coupon we got for a free rotisserie chicken and free cupcakes. neither me or hunter like cupcakes so i wasn't planning on getting them. then i decided i would just look...well thats all it took. cause they looked DEVINE. and they were free so what the heck right?

i go home eat dinner, and plan on taking a cupcake over for Noah and Jade to try (thinking nothing of it, we share food all the time). as i was about to walk out the door i remembered how i felt bleh and quickly remembered how whenever i'm feeling bad about myself the best cure is to make someone else happy. this someone is our neighbor. his name is Bill. the only interaction we've had is saying "hi" and "how are you" when we happen to leave at the same time or see each other outside. but he is one of the nicest people! so that was the person that i was going to serve, so that i would change my focus on someone else, even if it did nothing for them- it would for me. i put a cupcake on a paper plate and wrote a little note on it, set it in front of his door, knocked twice and then hurried down the stairs. at first i was just going to scurry along but when i got to the bottom i decided to just wait. i heard him open the door, then a few seconds went by, then i heard him do a little happy giggle to himself. as soon as i heard his reaction i got a smile on my face and walked away as he shut the door. that simple act over powered any of the negative thoughts or worries i was having.

i don't share this to let you see what i've done, but just to remind myself and others that serving others and making other peoples day and being selfless really is what happiness feels like. my goal is to "give one cupcake away" every day, even if its a really good day.

i don't even love cupcakes and i agree with this ^^

honey mooners

Since our life is moving kind of really fast, we only had time for a short weekend honeymoon before we moved to North Carolina! We went to park city right after our reception to spend a couple nights there. The hotel was BEAUTIFUL, in the mountains, all by ourselves, relaxing and lots of laughter! That is one thing i love about Hunter is that he can always make me laugh, i can be myself around him and we always have the funnest times no matter what we're doing! Here are a few pictures of our first few days as a married couple!

hot tubbin'

swimming and snowy mountains

long story...haha. we asked them to bring us a bucket of ice and they brought this huge grocery store ice bag. and didn't tie it. so i took it from hunter and somehow it just went all over the place. i might have peed my pants! hahah

The Chateaux was lovely

love me some gelato

midnight snack in bed

starbucks for breakfast

Crandall party of 2

the best day of my life

Friday, April 17th, 2015

Exactly a month from the day Hunter got home became the best day of my life. I wish i could remember every detail of that day. I do remember perfectly the feeling of joy and gratitude i had all day. I woke up, did a little work out (always helps), went over to my amazing neighbor to do my hair, then laken came over and did my make up…and off we went to the temple! Of course, being with mom and i we were rather early :) They got us right in and got everything ready that we needed to. Hunter wouldn’t let go of my hand, and i wouldn’t let him let it go either. They took us back seperatly to get all ready for the sealing then we met up again in the celestial room. The brides room was gorgeous and i was in heaven! It was everything i pictured since i went through the open house with Brooklyn. I was taken care of so lovely and felt like a queen. Because we arrived early that put us ahead of our family arriving there. So we were able to sit in the celestial room, hand in hand together for at least a half hour. So special, such a sweet feeling. Beyond beautiful. It hit me again what we were finally doing. We just stared at each other in awe that our lives together were beginning. It was time to go into the sealing room where our family awaited us. We met our sealer who was an angel. Seriously, Hunter and I looked at each other with our big wide blue eyes open thinking the same thing. He was perfect. As we walked into the room i saw all of our loved ones and just felt a flood of love come over us. The sealing was beautiful, it was tender, it was so spiritual and such a great reminder and explanation of what we were doing together that day. We are started our OWN family. Just me and him. He is the most important person on earth. And the decision i made to marry him is the most important decision i will make on this earth. He is my King and I am his Queen. 

We walked out the pretty, golden front doors and put our arms up together holding hands as everyone cheered for us! All of our family and friends were out waiting for us there supporting our new family! Kate Benson was our photographer and is simply amazing. We took pictures for a long time after we came out and trevor who is incredible with his camera, along with Rachel videographed everything! It was so fun. We just got married. FOR ETERNITY. How could we not be the happiest people ever? By the time we were done we were starving so we went and got Costa Vida. Funny story- the girls working there were like, “oh did you just come from a wedding?” i was like “yeah! ours. :)” haha they were like oh….wow! haha then they didn’t stop staring at us the whole time. Im hoping its just cause they thought we were a good looking couple haha. Then we went straight to the reception and got re ready for pictures again! Started kinda late…typical. But we got some stunning pictures!! We didn’t do a line (best idea ever). It made it so much more relaxed and fun for us. All the old people that came had heart attacks over it though. hahaha. poor oldies. The reception was magical and decorated so beautifuly! thanks to aunt les and mom. It was SO fun. We got to talk to as many people as could catch us and chase us! The cake…oh my so delicious. and we both hate cake- thats how good it was. Yes, it was messy. of course, not surprising with hunter being my husband. So funny. All in my hair. Way sticky and nast. Danced our way about the bouquet toss— markel caught it!! :) atta girl. Then the garder…oh boy hahaha. I told him not to lift up my dress so everyone and their dog could see…but that wasn’t happening so i hurry and flipped my dress over his whole body. bad idea hahah he poked me and i might have over reacted a little much and jumped and screamed a little hahaha. Anyways he finally got it and zach caught it! He was very happy about that i’m sure ;) Then we had a way fun dance party. Dad got his moves on. We partyed hard for a lil before we left then we were off running through a line of sparklers! Our car was straight up destroyed but seriously the best decorated car i’ve ever witnessed. So nasty. So dirty. So funny. 

wedding pictures to come.... for now, this is all i have :)

why wait when you know its right?

He got home the night of Tuesday, March 17th. Wednesday while we were in the car on the way home from shopping my brother in law Riley texted us on my phone asking us if Hunter would want to go do summer sales with them and told us all the benefits of it. We nodded at each other and said we would talk about it later. Well Hunter is the type of person that when i makes up his mind or wants something then he will get it done. He took my phone out of my hand and relpied, “ yes i’m coming.” then looks at me and says “you’ll come with me right?” I guess you could say thats when everything changed real quick and got real, real. Thursday the 19th we sat outside on his back lawn and talked about what we wanted our future to be like. It was a hard decision, we prayed together, we talked about pros and cons of going out, if we should go out together engaged, not engaged, or married (which sounded absolutely crazy) because i told him i’m not leaving him again. Thursday night hunter turned to me and said, “ lets just get married before. April 17th, then we can go out together and be married without any worries or leaving each other again. “ But wait, WHAT?! You literally just came home from serving a mission in Africa for two years. But, it felt like nothing but right. Nothing i would have guessed or expected in a million years, but this was God’s plan- not ours. And it was perfect. That night we went and told my parents our plan, they were all in!! Then his parents. Lets do this. We have a little less than a month to plan the wedding of the year. Our siblings were SO excited and SO supportive of us! Thats another reason it felt so right. 

We woke up Friday morning, 7AM and starting planning out of our pants. Seriously got so much done that day. Everything was falling into place and we were being so so blessed. I mean who books and amazing photographer, the temple and much more with 3 weeks notice?! We got all of the groomsmen outfits that day, ring shopping, ties, and much much more…its kinda a blur now. Oh and i quit my two jobs that day. My life literally just took a 720 degree turn. More change then i had ever thought i would go through all at once. All i thought and dreamt about was our wedding for the next 4 weeks. How were we going to pull this off?? Because we are us, our AMAZING families- could never have done it without them. The next couple weeks i never felt stress. Maybe once one day. It was bliss. It still is. Hunter is the man i’ve dreamed of marrying my whole life and more. He was so patient and loving with me through all the planning. We have fallen in love more each day, and i now know what that feels like. He is my better half. There was almost no time to play or even go on a date! But it never worried me. Sunday, March 22nd he had his homecoming talk at church. He joked that he was just going to purpose on the stand hahah…so glad he didn’t. He did simply INCREDIBLE. There are no words for how amazing he is and the man he is becoming. I fell in love with him quite a bit that day. (i may or may not have bought his ring during church…shhh) No one knew we were planning on getting married except our immediate families and a few others…which was funny and hard not to say anything all day haha!

the RM life

aren't they beauts?

welp, i've been home for almost 3 weeks now. its kinda hard to explain the feeling unless you've felt it before. it feels like i never left but at the same time i feel so weird to be home. i love being home with my family though!! i sure have missed them. i thought it would be weird coming home and not having hunter here...but its been a blessing and i've only felt peace and knowing he shouldn't be anywhere else. i love being a "missionary girlfriend" finally! :)

I had a little interview with my bishop yesterday. this is the council he gave me for when my sweetheart returns...

"kiss like you mean it, but don't make it long." 

i'll take it. ;)

-con amor, kelsey

p.s. you can read about my adventures in NY here!