Edumacated!

Cory is a graduate of Brigham Young University! Go Cougs! He is a true blue graduate and I am so proud of him.

Such an attractive graduate!
It was a whirlwind of busy-ness leading up to it though. We started the week on Saturday with finals that went through to Thursday. We had to miss commencement that day, though, because of work. On Friday Cory got a little graduation present with the surprise appearance of my dad! He flew in on Wednesday night and stayed with Lindsey and Brooke in Salt Lake. It was so fun to watch Cory's reaction when he saw dad sitting with all of us in the Marriot Center. The convocation ceremony was long, but it was so awesome to watch him shake all the hands and walk away a graduate! My Uncle Rick and Aunt Di made the long drive from Idaho to be there for it all. They are so awesome and we are so grateful for their support! I can't say much about the support from his dad, who came all decked out in U of U red. Verrrryy funny. :) 

The graduate, me, dad, Mattick, Maia, Lindsey, Unc Rick, Aunt Di

After the ceremony we all (16 counting the babies) went back to our house and made a delicious french toast brunch, it was so nice and relaxing. After visiting, Cory had to go to work, so I got to hang out with my sisters, nephews, niece and daddy. It was so fun to round up some dinner and run errands together. That night we had people on the sofa bed, on the floor in the guest bedroom, and one on a blow up mattress in the dining room. And, of course, Cory and I were nice and cozy on our king size bed. :) Saturday brought a morning run to the Y mountain and back for the three boys, Mike, Dad, and Cory. They got back just in time for some showers and last minute preparation for Cory's party!! This party had been on my mind for at least a month. I've had nightmares about the weather going cold and snowy and dreams of sunburned skin from time spent on the slip-n-slide. I checked the weather every hour and felt like I was on cloud nine when it showed 60 degrees and sunny for about 3 days leading up to it. Then, all of a sudden, things went from cloud nine to to fog quick. Friday showed Saturday's weather as rainy and cold. My nightmares had come true! We decided to keep the event outside in hopes that the sun would break through like it had Friday, but to no avail. It didn't rain, which was nice, but it chilled me to the bone. It was so fun, though, to get together with friends and family members to celebrate such an awesome feat. A big thanks to everyone who came, especially my cute cousins who came so close to breaking the pinata open! :) I'll have to post the videos of that later-so fun! I'm so proud, and jealous, of Cory.

School?

School is hard. You have to force yourself to get up when the alarm goes off. You may have just barely gone to sleep after studying. You try to grab a little bite to eat before leaving. At work, you think about all the school work you have to do. At class, you think about all of the stuff you have to do for your other classes. When your spouse is also going to school, you get to times all of this by two! School is hard.

So that's why I'm so excited for Cory's graduation!

 Last night he took a final and this morning he was up studying with a classmate. I think he may be more anxious and excited than I am, but just maybe! I'm even more excited for April 23rd when we get to celebrate it with everyone!

So you must all come for this glorious event. It's going to be at Rock Canyon Park and will be so much fun. I can't wait!

Busy Bees

Cory and I have been super busy lately. We are quickly approaching finals and all that entails. Which is a lot. Not only do we have to make sure to study, write the papers, maybe blow a kiss to each other, and make it to the tests on time, but there is also the issue of our work schedules! Luckily my job is on campus and my boss is very good about flexibility. But it is still a hassle to try and work with my coworkers and figure out when we can be in the office and when we can't. {Sigh} Life. It's crazy.
We've also been struggling to recover from our weekend adventure in Salt Lake. It all started Saturday night at around midnight (so I guess Sunday morning) when my dad called to tell us that Brooke (my sister)'s water broke and she was headed to the hospital. We decided that it would be good to go there to support her and given that it was General Conference and we didn't have to teach Sunday School, we left! We drove through a crazy snow storm to get there and finally managed to arrive at her room safely and with Wendy's in hand (midnight meal snack!) We were up until 5 am holding her hand, helping her breathe, making her laugh, playing with hospital equipment, and getting her through the epidural. It was a rough night for the two of us. I'm sure Brooke's was great. We finally found a little moment to grab the hospital couch cushion that is made for one person, lay it in the corner, and pass out for a very uncomfortable sleep. We woke up at ten and got back to work. My mom also flew in and took over our jobs, so we were able to grab a few z's here and there. Almost 7 hours later, Kaden Connor Mishler was born!

 He is a cute little baby and his big brother is going to love him.  So with all that went on, we have had a very difficult time feeling rested and energized this week.

Still so tired. 

We were able to visit with my mom and Brooke last night too and enjoyed some very delicious frozen yogurt. I'm almost 100% positive that Tyler was the one who ate most of everyone's. It was fun to visit and I'll be sad when she has to go back home, because, well, my mom is better than yours.

I let Tyler take pictures with my camera and he took about 100. This one actually turned out pretty cute!

Also! Cory got a promotion!

 He is now a personal banker and will start as soon as they can replace him. To honor his achievements,  I surprised him with a little "Congrats" balloon attached to a bag of Reeses eggs. I could have stopped there and I'm sure he would have been more than happy, but I decided to make him some homemade lettuce wraps and they turned out to be delicious!  I will definitely be making them again. So not only did they taste delicious, but they somehow inspired Cory to take me out shopping for my birthday (we moved it to later because I was so sick)!

Love.It was awesome. So yes, I will be making that magic recipe a lot! :) Anyway, I'm quite proud of that husband of mine and I can't wait to see how far he goes in life. 

A Love Triangle

First off, let me say how great Cory is for humoring me and writing a post every now and then. I think I'll make every Thursday a "Thursday's Thoughts" day because his was so great. All I did was tell him to write about 5 things he was thinking about right then. I loved his post.
Secondly, today is the first day of April! Rachel and I decided that we would take pictures of Todd and Cory and put them all over. It's been great. This is my favorite,

Cory was wearing those same exact shorts this morning. Maybe Todd had on a candy necklace? Some things never change...

Followed closely with these two,

A very necessary tummy touch.

You could say there's a love quadrangle going on with our two couples. I couldn't find a picture of Todd and Cory where they were NOT touching in some way. And they were ALWAYS next to each other. It was so funny. So not only them, but apparently Rachel and I are in love with each other as well. (we totally are)
So as I was thinking of this love triangle thing, I thought of other love triangles that have always left me conflicted. Sweet Home Alabama, While You Were Sleeping, Pearl Harbor, The Notebook, you get my drift. All these ah-maze-zing movies have such a dilemma and I never know what to think! Take Sweet Home Alabama, for instance. You have this guy,

Incredibly handsome with striking blue eyes and an amazing physique who is passionate and fiery. But then you have this guy,

The dark handsome type who is sensitive and rich and will defy his own mother just to be with you. And the actress has to choose!! I mean, come on! They couldn't have picked two more perfect opposites that are every girl's dream. I've always had a hard time with these movies. I never know which one I would pick. Who would? Or am I the only one? I think this problem of mine was known in Heaven, so Heavenly Father made a guy with all of the best qualities and brainwashed helped him to fall in love with me. So I got really lucky. McDreamy + McSteamy = Cory B. Oh yeah.

McCory.

Thursday's Thoughts

Cory's Thursday's Thoughts:

OPENING DAY 2011!!

San Diego's Cameron Maybin hit a 2-out solo home run in the top of the 9th inning to tie the Padres opening game up against the Cardinals. The Pads went on to win by a score of 5-3. Combine this with the Giants losing on national TV and you have yourself a pretty good opening day! It could have been better, though. The Yanks still won. 

Tomorrow morning I have an interview with the manager at the BYU branch of Wells Fargo. I'm interviewing to be a Personal Banker, which would be a super great promotion for me! I don't graduate for another 3 months, but they want to interview me now. I'm not sure why. But it's cool! My district of WF has tried hiring a part-time Personal Banker on a provisional basis, and it seems to be going well. So they might be trying that with me. But maybe not. Who knows? I'll let you guys know.

Softball is finally here. I have a meeting with the Orem City League Commissioner this coming Monday. Then it's only one more week until we're in full swing! It's all I've been thinking about lately! I can't wait. This is the year of the championship.

HA! Most awesome thing on the internet under 'Soccer.' Bree and I have our intramural quarterfinal soccer game tomorrow night. I'm super excited to play. I've decided that although I'm 26, I don't think I'm even close to being 'grown up.' I skipped the last part of one of my classes and changed into soccer clothes. I then spent the next hour and a half playing soccer by myself on the intramural fields. I was getting ready for our game tomorrow. I'll spend time getting the ball on my feet, but I can't resist a Reese's anything, so my net gain is zero. Better skills, fatter Cory. 

If UCONN wins their game against Kentucky, then I'll be the champion on the Lost Boys Tournament Bracket Challenge. Beating sports geniuses like Todd and Mark is enough to make me feel just terrific. Since this has been such a crazy March Madness there are only 2 brackets left that have even ONE team remaining. They belong to me and to Taylor. Tay has Kentucky, and I have UCONN. So if UCONN wins, I win the Bracket Challenge. If Kentucky wins, Tay wins it. So we have lunch riding on the game. GO HUSKIES!!

I can't stand to have my blog post end with "Go Huskies," so I have to say something more. Bree is my smart and beautiful wife. She is so cool to put this blog together and she keeps me involved with it. She's always making me delicious meals, and rubbing my feet and shoulders. I think all of us dudes did really, really well for ourselves. We all married way, WAY up. But I married the uppest of us all. I love Bree.

two dimes

So this week is Student Employee Appreciation week, of course! Every day I've gotten a different candy bar with some cute saying on it from my boss. For example, "You deserve a payday everyday!" and the candy bar is... a Payday! It's been great fun to anticipate the different candy bars everyday and it just makes me love my job even more. I have a great job. I not only get to walk down a hallway full of President Hinckley pictures to get to my office, but I also get my work done early and then get to do homework! (or I could do other things like blog stalk or plan Cory's graduation party-but more on that later.) So when I got to work yesterday and found a letter on my desk, I had no idea it could get better! But then I opened it to find this:

Yes! A raise! I didn't think that a $.20 cent raise could feel so good. I mean, it's only two dimes. And it's less than a quarter! But it's something. And it's awesome. 

There are a few things in life that are coming up that are very exciting! General Conference (Saturday and Sunday), Zander turns 16! (Saturday), Josie's birthday (Friday), Cory interviews for the Personal Banker position (Friday), and Saturday there is an event that involves this lovely thing...

Yes that's right! Rachel's bridal shower! I'm so excited for her and Todd to be married. I wish this Saturday was their wedding and not just some little shower... :)

it's in the genes.

Cory and I met in a volleyball class and, so I knew he was competitive before we started dating. I just didn't know how much! I, on the other hand, have always known how competitive I am. Very competitive.

Who would have thought that such a sweet girl would turn out to be so cut throat? Not Barbie!

 So last week when we had a co-ed intramural soccer game Tuesday night and I had a women's intramural basketball game Wednesday night and we both had serious competitive problems arise, I'm not sure why I was surprised! 

I blame it on my genes. 

This is my handsome dad holding me as a baby. Doesn't he look like Seinfeld? Or John Travolta?

And this is my dad now. See how mean he can get?

A story about my dear old dad involves him getting into a full on fist fight on the volleyball courts in college. Another example would be the fact that he didn't let having 3 girls before finally getting a boy stand in his way of helping us set up political yard signs in our backyard to use as practice hurdles. So basically, he's very competitive. He sends me videos of him doing some daring thing almost daily and he whoops my butt in any competition without even blinking an eye. In fact, his "woo-hoo" taunts show how not bad he feels about winning. 

On Wednesday night I had a flash of my Dad. I vehemently disagreed with a referee and called him out on his inability to call a fair game by noticing very clear fouls. We were down by one with 16 seconds to go and we had the ball down on our sideline. We managed to get two shots off and both had at least 3 clear fouls which would have won us the game had they been called because we were in bonus. I was irate. Shaking and mad. I may have said a few things in the ref's general direction as I walked out of the gym to try and calm down in the chilly Utah air. This ref followed me out asking what it was I wanted to tell him. (It was more like, "Hey! Do you have something you wanna say?" "Ya! You did an awful job!") I proceeded to drill him with the inadequacies that I noticed and how he was getting paid and that I think he did a terrible job hold a conversation with him about how he could improve his referee skills for the future! 

The funny thing was that just less than 24 hours before, my handsome husband had also gotten into a little argument with a referee in soccer and I had tried to get him to look at it in a more calm light and that he shouldn't be so upset. Thank goodness that he didn't try doing that with me. I wanted to marinate in my anger. So I will let him be mad next time. Maybe I'll lie a little about the ref to egg him on too! Who knows? :)

After these experiences I've dreaded the level of competitiveness that our children will have. 

This is very clearly our child.

Heads Up Seven Up will become like a day of Olympic sports to them. Other kids won't want to play two square or tether ball with them either! Poor kids.

Luckily our level of competitiveness is healthy for our relationship! :)

On a different note, one of Cory's Christmas presents finally came in the mail today! 

I'm not sure if I am feeding an addiction, or maybe this will make him not feel the need to always be on his ESPN app or watching all 3 ESPN channels. (P.S. Why do they need to have so many ESPN channels? They just say the same things. We all do just fine with one Food Network and HGTV!) This particular issue is the baseball preview and I think his heart may have stopped when he opened it.