Who let the water beads out?

I get a text from Michael this morning while I was at work saying something along the lines of, " We broke out the water beads, and I didn't know I wasn't supposed to do the whole bag." Side note, that bag had 2,000 water beads! 2,000 water beads that we now have to handle and take care of. He then said that multiple of our dishes and Tupperware are homes for these 2,000 little babies. Unfortunately one of the tall Tupperware tipped over, so now we have a nice water bead floor.

Thankfully they are only an outside toy, (lets hope it stays that way) and so we are enjoying our last few days of good autumn weather before the cold hits our city of St. Louis. Any moms out there that need to find ideas of how to entertain their kids during the "witching hour" of the days, whip these babies out and it is hardly any prep or stress on you! I love how they really make no mess, except for maybe the clean up, but we haven't gotten that far in our experience yet. We will let you know how it goes! 

Also here is the picture of Richard on the top shelf of our closet trying to get the candy from the last post. 

The Climber

Richard is a climber. We think he could climb a ladder before he could walk. Tonight, we put his Halloween candy on the top shelf of our closet, and he saw us put it there but we didn't think anything would come of it. We go upstairs to start dinner, and Richard runs downstairs and is very quiet. 2 things are wrong in this picture, Richard rarely goes downstairs by himself to play because he usually tries to drag one of us down there with him, 2. he was quiet. Nothing good comes when a toddler is quiet and by themselves. Michael runs downstairs to see that Richard has climbed to the top shelf  of our closet, and is hanging trying to get up there to get the bin of candy.  Determined kid we have. Made us laugh pretty hard and he thought he was pretty funny. We praised the determination, but unfortunately he didn't get his candy of the day until after dinner time. I swear we were the worst parents ever in his eyes. ;) Whenever he sees the candy that he wants, he always says mom what is that doing here as he tries to eat a piece and give me the smirk smile. Or he will try and offer it to us and then when we don't want it, he will stuff it in his mouth as fast as we could say no thank you. He is extremely smart and a little business man at heart.

Mental Wellness Challenge Day 2!

I have seen something going around the internet about a 20 day mental wellness challenge, and as the days get colder, and Rico and I tend to spend more time inside, I am trying to get a start to not get the "winter blues". I am only on day 2 and day 1 was go to bed an hour earlier, and so you can say I am basically crushing this challenge. ;) Today's challenge is to right 10 things that you are grateful for in your journal, and considering that my journal is in a storage unit with boxes completely surrounding it, along with 95% of our other belongings except for the same 5 shirts I got out and have worn for 3 months, I thought I would write them on here.
1. Obviously the most obvious, Richard. Holy cow this kid is a gem, and I may just be saying that because he is my child and every mom thinks that, but he has been the biggest blessing ever. He seriously is hilarious and will say the most funny things at random times to us. I am soo bad at writing things that he says or does down, and  I am realizing that all of the gems are being forgotten. So I am hoping to write more on this blog about random day to day experiences.
2. Michael. Michael is the hardest working person I know, and he is married to someone that could sit around and watch The Office all day with a big bowl of ice cream. When we bought our second house, it was because his funding was supposed to be ending after his 4th year, and he wanted to spend more time with Richard and being at home, rather than trying to find a job to do on top of schooling. So, we bought a fixer upper, and are renting out our house to amazing tenants. He would rather spend all of his energy working on that house, and having the flexibility so that I can go to work, and watch Richard.
3. Our short term rental. When the tenants moved in, we thought we would be done with the renovations on the new house (at least enough to move in), but we are 4 months, later we have moved 4 times and we are still continuing to work on our house. We found a short term rental that has been an absolute blessing so that we don't have to live in a house with no running water, and no kitchen.
4. My friends. The friends here in St. Louis have been the biggest blessings to Richard and me. It has also been extremely hard because we have made a lot of friendships, and then the friends leave to pursue jobs or further education, and we stay here. Friends make it so much easier to parent during hard times, because they validate, and I feel like that is the secret that every mom wants is validation that they aren't alone, or that they are doing the right things.
5. Our vehicles
6. Holidays! I told Michael yesterday that I could not live in a world without holidays.
7. Dr. Pepper, so silly, but Dr. Pepper gets me through the hard mothering days.
8. Electronics that I can video message and speak to  my family thousands miles away. If it weren't for skype, marco polo etc. I don't know how  I could handle living so far away from everyone.
9. My Job. I am a firm believer in that every mom needs something for them every day or something once a week whatever time, they need something continual. I work to keep my sanity, and it also makes me 100% better mom. My boss has been a huge blessing and has given me the freedom that we need so that I can be with Richard when I need to.
10. Seasons. Our street is currently lined with bright yellow, red and orange leaves, and it brings such a refreshing feel to everything. I love seasons, I love the changing of weather and the feeling to kind of start new again.
Wow if you guys made it this far, good for you!!! I will hopefully be updating short little moments that Richard and I have to hopefully keep others informed about things, and hopefully make this a my "journal"!

Our First Home Master Bathroom Renovation

Instead of putting all of the before and afters in one post, I thought that I will bunch them up into categories. I thought I would hit it off with one of the biggest transformations of the house- the bathroom. This bathroom was scary. No other words could describe it. I never knew that green counter tops, showers and walls were a thing until I saw this house. We wore flip flops every single day that we showered because no matter how much you cleaned it, you just couldn't get the beginning scaring condition out from your mind. Its funny how you get used to things, and you don't see it for how it actually is. We got used to the bathroom, and it didn't bother us. It was when people came to visit that made us remember that we have to fix this situation now. I think my mom begged us several times to get started on the bathroom. Let this be known that we started this renovation when Richard was just over a year. This whole renovation took almost a year from starting to complete finish. It was the very last thing that Michael did the day that the tenants came to move in. It was quite a project, but I couldn't be more proud of Michael.
To start it off, I knew we needed that jetted tub out, and that I wanted a double vanity. In order to do that, we had to move the shower over to where the tub was, and move the toilet across the room to where the shower was. Michael moved all of the plumbing himself and it was kinda tricky. The wall inbetween the tub and the shower needed to be moved back but that was the only thing that really needed to be structurally done. Basically all new dry wall throughout the room, added recessed lighting throughout, and new lighting on the wall of the vanity. New mirrors, flooring, and of course my favorite vanity ever from costco. All new baseboards and crown molding as well. It was super hard to move away from my dream bathroom, but it is all worth it in the end. Hope you enjoy the before and afters!

My Cracker Loving Boy

I have a 1 year old cracker loving boy. He loves to move and explore. He loves anything he isn't supposed to get into and loves his mommy and daddy more than anything. Separation anxiety is hitting hard to our cracker loving boy. He is persistent with his emotions and feelings which makes me dream of him as an older man with thick curly long locks, using that same persistence and drive in his life to do good. My cracker loving boy loves to explore. He loves to go into every space he can and pull and rip anything he can. He is an energetic boy. He has a heart of gold. I didn't think that one year old's could have such sweet genuine emotion to them and show it towards other people, but he does. He loves his stuffed animals and puts them right in his face and gives them "kisses". Now and again though I do find some animals along with mommies kitchen utensils down the empty air vent in the kitchen so we may have to work on that a little more :) We can count on him standing in the same area of his crib, beaming ear to ear when we first make eye contact after a good nights rest. He loves dogs, but is scared by them too. My cracker loving boy is not a snuggler unless there is a nightly bottle insight. The food that he loves most is crackers. He knows where I put them in the cupboard and he will go right to that one and reach on his tippy tippy toes to get them. I have not seen him sit down and work on something longer than he does trying to get crackers out of the sleeve. He loves to stick different objects in holes (hence the animals in the vent). He clenches his fists and screams of excitement when he sees any food he wants especially a pouch.
We love our cracker loving boy and am so grateful for the stress and the growth that he has brought us, but also the exuberant amount of love and happiness that he brings to us everyday. Michael and I sometimes just sit and watch this cracker loving boy and just laugh at the things, noises, faces that he pulls. (Yes such an only child thing to do)
We have loved this 13 months of being with this boy and look forward to the many many many more years of him teaching us life long lessons.

Tired

The 9 months of not getting very good sleep has really been hitting me the last 2 weeks. Richard has always generally been a good sleeper. He wses up about once a night, but that once a night is killing me. I usually get up early, go to work feel good and motivated and then once i come home and 1-4 pm  hits i am exhausted. Anyone else feel this? I have tried to take naps, but napping usually makes me more tired and grouchy. The horrid time hits and I have no energy to do anything. I want to sleep, but I know it will be worse when I wake up. Our meals have been slacking, I try and do chores and I get them halfway done and can't finish. I think the answer to all of this is just going to bed earlier. Anyone else have good advice?!

What Happened?

What happened to love and kindness? What happened to the thought of we are all unique, we bring different strengths and weaknesses to the board and we all accept each other?
I have been quite distraught at the things that I have seen the last couple of weeks on social media, as I am sure everyone else has too.
Not by what the President has put out or by the things that celebrities who think that they are higher or have power of us, but of the things that people on my level, my friends, have said and how they have acted. Because of this, I have deleted my Facebook, because it wasn't doing anything positive or my life. It wasn't making me feel better, and wasn't making me think better. If anything it was making me sick, and angry to read things that people say to each other whether it is hurtful or not because they thought that their thinking was the only correct way.
The main thing I can't get off of my mind the last week and I have expressed to Michael many times is, these people would not say these things to the recipients face. (well maybe some would, but they need a filter :)) These people are hiding behind a keyboard putting people down for their beliefs, their looks, their religion and they think they can because know one see's them physically. They are hiding, or so they think.
I have been contemplating and thinking about this the last week and while I was going to pick Michael up yesterday at work, I saw the sunset and the freeway backed up filled with people who all had one goal in mind, to get somewhere. It made me think of everyone here, we are all here put on this place called Earth to figure out how to survive. We are ALL desperately wanting and craving love, friendship, closeness, respect, and acceptance. I don't know one person who doesn't want any of those things. We all have the same feelings of, struggles, fears, hardships etc. they may not be the same from person to person, but we all experience the emotions of it. Donald Trump doesn't have the fear of financial problems as Michael and I do, but Donald Trump has the hardship of being over a country and having millions of people hating him. I don't care about what he has done, but can you imagine if you had that many people hating you and comparing you to a man that killed 6 million Jews? (which I think is extremely disrespectful and rude, but I can see people could think that) I am sure that is a hardship for him. (people say he has an ego that wouldn't be affected, but seriously he isn't emotion less)
I become really frustrated with Michael sometimes because I ask his opinion on certain political topics, and his answer is, he doesn't have one. He doesn't know enough of each side of the story to form a answer that he is comfortable to stand with.  Does anyone have the FULL understanding of things, of both sides of the coin or is your opinion skewed?  He talks about how people are so emotionally attached to their opinion that anything that is contrary to that is wrong and shouldn't be understood. He never will claim himself as a republican or a democrat, because there are good to both things, he doesn't believe full republican and he doesn't believe full democratic, because each have good qualities that can build off of each other. I hope and strive to be like Michael.
I have been thinking of how to write this post for the last two weeks and I hope that I have been able to portray, that we are all humans. We all cry, suffer, and crave understanding. No one thought is correct whether you think it is or it isn't. I have tried the last two weeks to understand, to not judge, to see people for who they are and to see them as the Savior see's them which is perfect love. I am so excited for February to focus on love because the World needs it. Love is what lasts and builds people up.

Where I'm From

I had to do this poem for my education english class and I had a lot of fun coming up with it. Enjoy!


I am from the big red rocks in Southern Utah.
From ballet shoes, and gigga pets
I am from the split level brick home at the bottom of a large hill.
It was always filled with laughter.
I am from mulberry trees and volcanic rocks.
Where only plants that required little water could grow.
I’m from the game and music filled home.
From Tracie and glen and my 4 older siblings.
I’m from the tradition enthusiasts and where family is everything.
From being told to be kind and where hard work is the key to success.
I’m from a very religious home who goes to church every week and lives our religion everyday.
From Danish decent who traveled to America for religion.
From Danish pancakes and root beer freezes.
From a man long ago who fought for religion and was in Carthage Jail with the first prophet of our church.
The walls held precious photos that held memories from the past.
I am from a family that taught that marriage and a family is the goal. These teachings lead me to the life that I live now.

2017, The Year of The New

2016 was a dream year for Michael and I. It was the year of many firsts, the year of ups and downs but overall a great one. We gained the biggest blessing life has to offer, our sweet Richard. He has brought us so much happiness and love that I could never dream of having. The love that I have for my sweet Richard is just a glimpse of how much the Savior loves us. 2016 was a year full of learning. Learning how to care for this fragile, tender new baby while juggling school and work. Learning how to better cook on a stove that only two burners worked on and an oven that only the top burner worked. Learning how to find myself and especially learning and choosing to be happy.
After I had Richard, I had experienced a lot of sadness and fear. Everyone talks about the actual birth of a baby and how grueling it can be, but I didn't hear a lot about the recovery and months following birth. I cannot complain because I had about the easiest physical recovery ever, but the emotional side of recovery was not the easiest. Satan uses his power to make us feel low, to make us feel like we aren't good enough, to make us just plain scared and sad. The days after I had Richard were some of the lowest days that I never want to go back to and that is because I allowed Satan to enter my thoughts about the situation. I think it is perfectly normal for women to have hormonal emotions and all of that, but for me personally it was because I let my thoughts wander.
I had a healthy baby there, and yet, Satan used my experience of giving birth and tried to make it a negative and scary thing. I do believe that because I wasn't prepared emotionally and physically for the type of birth experience that I had, that I do have a little "trauma" related with it. Of course I would do it all over again to get the amazing blessing that Richard is, but that doesn't mean that hard things didn't come with it. For the last couple of months, I had to figure out how to be happy again, to figure out what I wanted out life and what my goals were for my future, my family etc. This didn't just come over night, this was months of thinking, pondering, reading the scriptures and praying about. So as I was thinking about the goals that I want to set for 2017, the main topics that I am working on is bettering myself. Plain and simple. No intense long goals, just finding things that make me happy. Finding things that challenge me, things that help me grow or discover new talents. I am focusing on bringing things into my home that only allow me to be the greatest person I can be. So with this, I can be a better mother, wife, sister, daughter, and friend. Heavenly Father wants you to be happy. He doesn't want you to completely forget about yourself and submerge yourself in pleasing and working for others. He wants you to figure out yourself, so that way you can then be the best servant for him. So with your new goal setting, I challenge everyone to at least set one goal aside to just yourself, not your family, your work, your house, just you. This may seem a little self centered, but with all that I have thought and gone through, it is okay to be a little self centered and to care for yourself. So cheers to a new year, a new chance to find things so that we can be truly happy.

1 month baby update

How can my little boy be 1 month old on friday?! People always said that time flies by when you have a kid so cherish every moment and they are right. He already seems so much bigger and not an tiny newborn. So far we have figured out that he
Loves:
-snuggles with anybody that will snuggle
-to eat
- to sleep! He has been such a good sleeper so far. He usually wakes up 3 times a night and then goes right back down
- his hands right by his face at all time
-to sleep with his hands in a u shape by his head( as you will be able to tell with the pictures)
-loves to look at ceiling fans, whether they are running or not he loves them.

With loves comes dislikes!
-he hates being messed with. I think this is all babies, but if he doesn't want to be messed with and you do, he will let us know he doesn't care for it.
-he hates baths. I think there has been 1 bath since we have brought him home that he hasn't had a compete melt down for.
-not a big fan of getting his diaper changed
-Hates being hungry even the slightest. Most babies do, but this kid loves to eat.

We are seriously so blessed! Richard is such an amazing baby. He is so content and the only time he cries is when he is either tired or hungry. He loves to just hang out with us and be held. Even then, he instantly stops crying when you either pick him up, or you're done with what he doesn't like.

 Naps like these are quite often around thus house

Richard Michael sauceda birth story

In honor of it being my due date, and our boy being 3 weeks old, I thought it would he a fun idea to share my birth story with people who would even care to read it. :) get ready for a long story!

The whole process started on Sunday morning when I was driving to church and I had told Michael I hadn't felt the baby kick that morning which was quite unusual. I just shrugged it off and didn't think anything of it because this kid didn't move that much to begin with. I left church early (to get dinner ready for 2 of our couple friends who were coming over that night and also because at this point in my pregnancy, my ribs in my back hurt so bad I couldn't sit down for very long at all without being In  tears). This day was non stop going for me and so I didn't really have much time to think about feeling him kick. Our friends came over and after they left, it came back to my mind and I kind of got worried then. I had been feeling full contractions  (not really Braxton hicks) for a good couple of weeks and even those stopped the whole day. I called my mom and mother in law and both said to lay down for a while drink a sugary drink and wait. So I got some dr.  pepper (which I hadn't drank my whole pregnancy and it was divine) and nothing, no kicks. We got a little worried and everyone said for us to go get checked. It was already around 9 pm and we didn't want to wait much longer so, Better safe than sorry. we left our house with nothing but my phone charger and made our way to the hospital.
We got there,they hooked me up and everything was looking good. About an hour into it, all of a sudden Michael and I realize the babies heart rate dropped down to 50's from 140's for a good 10 seconds and the nurses came running in and that's when I knew I was in this for the long haul. They obviously said they didn't like that and so then we had to stay for 2 more hours. After the 2 hours the babies heart rate stayed up so the nurse came in and told me to get dressed and that we were going to go home. I had my pants on and the doctor came in and said put your robe back on you are staying. She said I had 2 options. 1. I could get induced because I was 37 weeks which is considered full term or 2. I could stay and get monitored for 24 hours. (The main reason I got a midwife at the start of pregnancy is because I wanted more natural AND DID NOT WANT TO GET INDUCED) so I went with option 2. I was upset but knew that that was the safest thing to do. I moved to another room and it's about 2 am at this point so Michael goes home and got good sleep. Me on the other hand got about an hour total. I was so sick of the hospital at this point because even going to the bathroom was such a pain with all of the chords I had to carry around. As I was getting back into bed from going to the bathroom, his heart rate dropped again. This happened again as I was getting into bed a couple of hours later. After the second one of the day, another doctor came in and said you are not going home because we don't feel comfortable with this, so we are basically making the decision and we are going to induce you I automatically was nerves and very very emotionl. Throughout this whole thing I hadn't talked to my midwife at all and was kind of needing her guidance. It just happened to be that she was delivering babies all day and was right down the hall.
SIDE NOTE: about halfway through my pregnancy, my blood work came back with my blood platelet count at about 120. This kind of had my midwife worried so around month 8 she had me re-do my blood work and my platelet count went down to 90's Then dropped down to 70's by the time I was in the hospital. This was not good because to get any pain medication, your platelet count has to be above 100. So 2 days before I went into the hospital, I got put on steroids to help boost the levels so I could get an epidural. HENCE WHY I WAS FREAKED OUT TO GET INDUCED BECAUSE I KNEW THAT I WAS DOING THIS ALL NATURAL.(end of side note)
My midwife came in and calmed me down and said they would put me on a steroid through my iv to see if my numbers would go up fast.( I had the iv in me for 4 1/2 days not fun) They were around 80's at this point. I went up to labor and delivery and got to eat my last meal! The anesthesiologist came in and said the steroids didn't help and that an epidural was a no go. I cried and cried. This happened to also be when Michael had run home to get some things and so I bawled to my nurse. From this point on, I knew that I had to think positive and anybody i talked to had to be positive. They started me on pitocin around 9 pm. I was already at a 3 with 80% effacement when I came into the hospital . I called my friend who loves natural birth and is very knowledgeable to come and help me with some breathing techniques and her husband came as well to help Michael give me a comfort blessing. They came and it was an ultimate life saver. After they left I was feeling set( little did I know). I was feeling good, we went and walked around for a while which was a huge pain because I had so many monitors hooked up to me but loved getting out of bed. Every 30 minutes they up the amount of pitocin until you get to a 20. Right before we tried to sleep I got to a 20 and they let you just sit there for about an hour. It was around 1 am and this is when I started to feel it. It was mostly in my back and not much was helping. It got worse and worse and I had her check me and I was at a 4 and I also had a bloody show. This was a good sign!! About 20 minutes later, I sat up in my bed and my water broke. I was so glad it broke on its own and they didn't have to break it! As soon as my water broke the contractions kicked in about double in intensity. I had to go to the restroom and of course this is when they got so bad I couldn't move until the contractions were over. All I knew was that I could not go lay down on that bed again and so they got the exercise ball out and I labored on that. My contractions were about 15 seconds apart the whole time which meant not a whole lot of a break. This was around 2:30 am. I bounced on the ball while Michael rubbed my lower back. He was a lifesaver. I was in a lot of pain and my nurse felt so bad because there was nothing I could have. After about an hour I went from a 4 to a 7  and after I was at a 7 she said I had to get off the ball. Worst news all night. They called my midwife and she didn't think anything of it because you can be at a 7 for a while. After this each contraction felt stronger and stronger. I went on my hands and knees because I had heard that was comfortable. The worst decision ever. This was the most intense pressure I have felt in my whole entire life. I couldn't do much during a contraction but just groan through the pain which then meant Michael and the nurse yelling at me to breathe. Breathing seemed to be inpossible. Did I say there was a LOT OF PRESSURE?! I was very very uncomfortable. Around 4 am I had to lay down and the nurse knew that there was not much time left until he came out. She grabbed a doctor from the hall and as a contraction came the doctor said no wonder I was feeling so much pressure because his head was right there. My midwife was still 15 minutes away and there was no way she was going to make it. This point there seemed to be no break in between contractions and there was no stopping this pushing. Because of no break, I could not make it down to the bottom of the bed and so the doctor basically had to get on the bed to deliver richard. :) I pushed about 5 times and then our worst nightmare happened. His heart rate dropped and kept dropping and everyone panicked. The doctors started talking about emergency c section but obviously that wouldn't work. More nurses came in, one on the phone with the nicu, one putting an oxygen mask on my face and Michaels voice instantly went from supportive and strong to fear. Everyone was yelling at me to push as hard as I can before his heart rate just stops. I only had to push a couple of more  times and his head was out and the  doctor pulled him out the rest of the way. The pressure was so intense while pushing that I didn't feel much pain. I was completely out of it and my nurse had to nudge me to open my eyes because my baby was right there. They put him on me and everything was perfect! He was perfect. He didn't take him away to clean him, they left him on me for an hour and wiped him off the best they could. I didn't tare as bad as I thought and they then numbed me down there to stitch me up  (yes after I had the baby they numbed me a little bit)
 as soon as I saw my boy I knew that his name was supposed to be Richard. Richard is my grandpa's name who recently passed away, he also married Michael and I and he was truly one of my heros. I knew that my 3 grandparents were on the other side helping me through that, especially my grandpa Richard. After an hour I was up moving around which is something that I loved about not having an epidural. Richard was also wide awake for his first two hours which I also loved. My labor was the most intense thing I have and probably will ever have to endure, but I did it and I got a sweet boy out of it and so I would do it again in a heart beat. I love my little family!

Life According to my Phone

School and life has taken over and blogging has not been included. So here are a few RANDOM photos from my phone that have described our lives recently. :) 

I got out of Nursery and got put back in Primary but this time with Michael! We teach the most ADORABLE KIDS EVER!!! 

This is how we spent some of conference. (it is so hard for us to stay awake) maybe we should eliminate the blankets and couch :) We only slept for maybe 5 minutes each though. 

We have very healthy smoothies almost everyday. Some days are better than others :) 

First Michael got a very much needed hair cut

We have had to figure out how to work our not so nice oven and this was after 2 minutes of them being in the oven. Yes I slaved over homemade rolls for 2 days and all of them were ruined. :(

Our yard is still infested with squirrels. yes they have made a little hole for them to get into our garbage and make a mess.

We go on date nights across the street on med campus and take pictures in front of our favorite front building. SLU hospital. We think it is so cool looking! 

isn't he so handsome?!?!?! 

I think this will only be the pda photo you will EVER see, we both aren't very into them so I thought our one should make it on the blog.
We NEVER go out to eat (occasional pizza when we stumble upon coupons) but when we do, it's probably at our favorite restaurants 1. Texas Roadhouse (mainly for those rolls) 2. Old spaghetti Factory

We finally made it to IKEA.

There is a SLU track on our street so Michael runs while I fast walk ;) This is him showing off his sweet shirt his dad got him from California and how weak he was from running :)

Hopefully this little post will keep you updated on what we have been doing. Since Michael and I started school, there hasn't been much down time. We have about an hour during the day that we can see each other and then I am off to work till 10:30. Lots going on and it is keeping us VERY busy!! Not much has happened with the house, we have made it live able and thanks to my dad the walls are all painted so we are doing just little stuff \here and there when we have an empty Saturday. 

XOXO Allie and Michael!

Horrible Blogger

I am officially the WORST blogger ever. This was supposed to be a place where we keep our family and friends updated but, life gets busy and so we will play a lot of catching up to do. :) 

As we were driving to Kansas for labor day weekend, I realized that I have not even blogged about our adventurous trips to Mexico!! Okay, guys this is REALLY bad. That trip was 2 months ago. :) 

I can explain, I have started school and have two jobs and I don't really have extra time, like ever. So little by little, the blog will be updated. Also, I got my first smart phone and unfortunately we never really use our main camera anymore, so those pictures are just sitting there wanting to be blogged about. :) 

This week I PROMISE that I will blog about our first week in Mexico while we were in Cancun. Aunt Mel, I want you to hold me up to this. ;) 

Wish me luck! 

XOXO 

Allie 

Pictures

A lot of people have been asking to see pictures of our new place. I understand, but we just want everything to be right. Right now, our home doesn't look like a home, it looks like a construction sight. We don't want people to see the place we call home as a disaster. We want to do good before and after pictures so you can see how much hard work we have put in on the house. Be patient my friends, pictures will come soon. Hopefully this week we will get boxes unpacked and things actually put away so it feels like a home. Hopefully we can have pictures put up by the end of next week. :)
XOXO
Allie

Bigger Picture

Right after I had written the post about all the bad things that are happening in our house, the security lady came into my work and without her even knowing, she showed me the bigger picture of things and taught me how life isn't always as bad as it seems. She came in and was asking about the house and  how things are going. So I continue to tell her all the things and she came back with you gotta go through bad to get to the good. Things will turn out good, they wont stay bad forever. That hit me, it made me realize that yeah, we have some problems but if we just came into this house without any problems, we wouldn't have learned the things we have learned. Michael wouldn't have been able to fix 40 burst pipes, or learn how to put in a new water heater by himself, or learn how to patch up drywall all by himself. She had no idea that what she said impacted me a lot, but it seems to be those times where you aren't really searching or hoping for an answer when you get it. This security lady is the most spiritual person I have ever met. Everything she talks about is how Jesus saved her by his grace. How amazing is that. Through her cruddy times in life, she brings it back to Jesus and how blessed she is. She has been a big influence on Michael and my life. (Except for the fact that she wants to put Michaels hair in dred locks and asks me every time she see's me if she can. ;)
Another lady that has made a big impact on me is the shuttle driver that drives around Slu's campus. It's kind of crazy that two ladies who I have met completely randomly have impacted me so much. This bus drivers name is Loraine and she is amazing. If she meets you once, she will remember you forever and will remember everything about you. I sometimes would ride the SLU shuttle just to talk to Loraine. She taught me how to be kind, how to always be a listening ear when you need it. Like I said, she remembers everything, knowing Loraine and seeing her talk to others, has made me want to have that trait. To have the trait of listening and honestly caring to remember. Michael absolutely loves Loraine as well. She is like our grandma here in Missouri. I love these two ladies dearly, and I am so grateful for the random moments where I have met these ladies so they could impact mine and Michaels life. :)
These two ladies have made me see the bigger picture in life. Things always aren't as bad as you seem. With going to Mexico it also opened up my eyes that we are very fortunate to have a roof over our head, these problems are blessings!! This house is a blessing and it came straight from God. .How blessed we are.

The Leaking House

Our house leaks. I swear everything that could leak, does. We should have known when we first found the leaky bay window that that was not the start. 40 burst pipes later, a leaky shower head, a leaky washing machine and the latest a leaky fridge. The fridge has its own problems. We thought it worked when we plugged it in because it sounded like any other fridge sounds like when it gets cold.  So we go to the store a couple of days ago,buy groceries stick them in the fridge and realized, hm.... pretty sure a fridge is not supposed to be hot. Not quite sure where our brains were, but we thought it would be a good idea for us to keep the milk and sour cream in the fridge for a couple of days until the garbage man comes so it doesn't stink up the house. Not quite sure why we didn't pour the milk out, but just bare with us. :)
So, yesterday morning, I come down the stairs and this AWFUL fishy smell was coming from somewhere in the middle floor. Well, Michael had just sanded drywall and his mother told us it had an awful smell, so we just assumed that was where the smell was coming from. So we leave to go to church, come back and the smell had gone away. Super weird, but we just went with it. Michael then decided to put the sour cream and milk in a garbage bag and left it by the door to be taken out. He lifts up the bag and something has spilled and leaked on our floor, the fishy smell came back for a second. We got that cleaned up and then I go in the kitchen later that night to clean up, and I see a leak under the fridge. Well that is weird because we cleaned under that fridge so that spill wasn't from the people before us. So Michael pulls back the fridge and instantly the fishy smell comes back. We found the source of the ticking!!!! (that quote is for my family ;) Well, Michael opens up the fridge to see if it is coming from in there, and spoiled milk just comes running out. Oh lovely, so we have this awful rotten milk substance all over the kitchen floor. Then we decide we just need to get the fridge out of the house, so Michael drags it to the door  (another one of us not thinking) and liquid just pours out as he drags it. Why didn't we clean it out before? Who knows. So then we have a long streak from the kitchen to the doorway of spoiled milk. Then we realize the fridge can't fit out the back door so there it sits while we clean up this mess frantically so it doesn't get in the cracks of the baseboards or wood floor. We got it all cleaned up with a lot of bleach and a lot of scrubbing so now the kitchen smells like bleach and the lingering smell of rotten fish. :) It was times like those that in the moment we were thinking nothing right has gone on with this house!!! But I look back on it and can't help but just laugh.
We just bought our first big appliance a brand new stainless steel fridge in hopes that that carries us for the rest of the time while living there and for future renters. Oh the joys of being a house owner and for being an adult and dealing with things instead of letting your parents or apartment maintenance guy  handle them. :)
Hope you enjoyed our Sunday happenings
XOXO Sauceda's from Saint Louis!

The Move

Today was the big day for packing up our apartment. It has been full of mixed emotions. This place was the place where Michael and I shared our first year of marriage. This apartment was our home away from home. It served us as a place where we felt safe from the outside world aka drunks and rioting in the streets. This place holds a lot of memories. It has seen a lot of tears but also a lot of laughter. It has only been one year in this place, but it will be sad to say goodbye. 

We move all of our things over to the new house tomorrow, and we will spend one more night in our apartment before we leave to Utah for a month and a half. 

I have always had a hard time throughout my whole life of the thinking that the grass is always greener on the other side. That is something that I have to work at constantly. There were lots of times where I hated this place. I wanted to move closer to friends, or just away from this place. Because whenever you walked on our carpets your feet were black and sticky, we didn't share walls with anyone but the doors were so thin that you could hear every word  from peoples apartment while walking down the hall(hearing many things we didn't want to hear), we had to pay 1.50 per load so $3.00 for a wash and dry of laundry and the list goes on. But, this place was our home. I worried so much about the things I didn't like that it inhibited me from living in the moment and being happy with where I am at. This place was where I did my first year of cooking, it was in this home where I have learned amazing lessons and learned to live away from family and all friends, our living room held many dance parties and movie nights. Someone in their testimony at church today said, if you go looking for something, you will find it. That really stuck out to me, If I keep looking for the negative things in life and look at what others have and wish I had it, I will find the negativity and my life wont be happy.  

So as Michael and I move on to the next phase of our life as new homeowners, I will strive to look at how much greener my side of the grass is. I will look at the quarky things that our house has and find it unique instead of a burden. I challenge everyone reading this post to find ways in your life that maybe you could look for the positive and be content. I know that when I have done it, I have been a lot happier and get more joy out of life.

XOXO Sauceda's from St. Louis! 

OUR FIRST HOME!

As everyone basically knows, we bought a house this last week. We had found a house right around the corner a couple of months ago, but it was gone before we could even look at it. We were very sad about it because the location is perfect, literally perfection. It is about a 5 minute drive from our old apartment, so we will stay in the same ward which we are happy about. Then one day I randomly looked at zillow around the area and I found our baby for super cheap. It was seriously crazy because I never look at zillow. So the second I saw it, I called Michael and we were on our way to go look at it. It had been on zillow for less than 1 day when I saw it. So we lined up Raymond the Realtor and got going. Literally a couple weeks after we found it, we were signing paperwork to put in an offer. The listing price was low because the seller knew that there was a lot of work to do. We knew that we had to have a good offer because there would be people coming in with cash offers and just wanting to flip it and sell it. That was one of the hardest weekends just waiting not knowing if we were going to get it or not.
  Well, clearly we did and we were so excited. The day we closed, we were in the house working. That night we were greeted with two leaks in the bay window, this was only the beginning.

this was the result of the two leaks. 

Michael has a couple of left, but he fixed 30 burst pipes on all three floors. ALL THREE FLOORS. We thought that this was crazy! The people left in the fall didn't winterize it of course and so no one had been in there all winter. This resulted in a lot of drywall and insulation being ripped out as well. Our floors look like they are white because it sticks to your shoes and you track it all over the house. (gets really frustrating after cleaning a floor and then it looks exactly like it used to ;) ) He looked up youtube videos and other tutorials on how to do it and saved us literally thousands of dollars, his fingers still are super sore and hurt so bad. I am so grateful that he learned how to do it and put in the effort to save our little family money :) Michael says that he has touched all the piping in the whole house, his head has been in all parts of the ceilings. I think it is time for him to get a hair cut because his hair is a mop with all of the dust and drywall up in the ceilings so we have had many cleaning out the hair parties. (Don't worry nothing get's left in there like beetles or anything ;) Well now we know we don't have any scary critters living in our walls. :) These are just some of the holes

You have to look close in this one, but under the box there is a huge hole and then a long stretch of open. This was taken before we found mold because they had overflowed the toilet and just let the water drip down, so about 1/4 of our garage ceiling is just taken out :) 

The living room

The living room

The kitchen 

basement
We went and cleaned up the walls so they will be easier to put drywall back in. :) 

Like I said these are just a FEW of the holes. Now just imagine about 3 or 4 bursts in each hole and you have Michael's life these last 3 days.

Well, I think that this will be all for today's blog post. We have to keep you interested and coming back for more :) There is a lot of work we have to do to it still, but we have so many ideas and we are getting so excited to start and have our first home together. :)

 XOXO Sauceda's in St. Louis!

Memorial Day 2015

So as many of you may know, I love holidays. I especially love dressing up for holidays and eating food that color coordinates with it. :) (I know a little weird) So for memorial day, we went and got blue and red Gatorade, hot dogs, chips, watermelon (our second one this summer and it's only May)etc. Typical memorial day food. I seriously get giddy over doing fun stuff like this.

Don't mind my extremely frizzy hair ;) Not quite used to the humidity here.
Like I said, I love dressing up for holidays. Got the shirt for $5, earrings $3 and bracelet free :)