The Joy of Parenting!

Well maybe not "parenting".... but close enough.  Josh and I have expanded our family and now own a wonderful, crazy, very cute but mostly terrorizing 7-month old chocolate lab named Kona and we already love her VERY much --who knew it only took 2 days?  It's a lot of hard work, but it's about time I had some unconditional love around here!  

This picture cracks me up!  This is her favorite toy

Our Pretty Bedroom

Although I'm sure I'll change the room soon, here are the first ever pictures of inside our new home!  

OPTIMISM -- day dreamer more eloquently spelled

-- Mark Twain

I've had a fantastic week full of reflection and uplifting friends! On Wednesday I had the opportunity to go to the temple with a long-lost friend from college and we had such a wonderful time! She really helped me start putting things in perspective and realize all of the wonderful blessings my trials have been in disguise!

And first of all -- my wallet was found! I didn't write about this because I was waiting fore more people to feel sorry for me, hello!!!! A few days after it was stolen, (and after many, many prayers that God would just allow it to be sitting on my desk, unscathed...) I got a call from the bar down the street saying they had found my wallet in the trashcan of their bathroom! Gosh, I must have left it there after I got hammered... I am just so grateful that Heavenly Father does answer prayers! Hooray!

Anyway,

I have decided that although life really sucks sometimes, being optimistic about it maybe isn't that bad after all. My new goal in life is to turn all of those little "ick" moments into something good. For example:

THE BAD-- Josh hurt his GOOD KNEE! why, oh why. (let's pray for no surgery this time!)

THE GOOD -- Maybe I can beat him at tennis now that he can't run after the ball?

THE BAD-- Camera still gone, sniff.

THE GOOD-- If I have no camera to take pictures of, I can't have pictures to look bad in!!!

THE BAD-- Still not feeling great, doctors still can't pin it down.

THE GOOD-- "Mystery disease" can get me out of subbing in nursery.

THE BAD-- Have to go back to my second job next week.

THE GOOD-- Actually, it's not that bad. I secretly like having friends that are still in high school

THE BAD-- My house is a mess. How does that happen in just one week?

THE GOOD-- I've been practicing my manipulation skills all day -- Josh might just be tricked into wanting to clean it, even with only one leg.

THE BAD-- Someone, oh someone please help me decorate my house! I am a failure!

THE GOOD-- No one comes over to see it, I can keep my decorating failure to myself!

Actually, I finally got curtains for our bedroom! It is finished! I will take pictures (with my other camera, but keep that one a secret so it doesn't get stolen) and awe you with how good it looks despite my aesthetic ineptitude.

PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN

Josh and I are SO happy to announce the newest US Citizen: mom Mary Lund! We're so proud to call her our little Kiwi-American! Now if we could just convince her to vote this fall...

When it rains, it pours...

Today's rain seemed to be an echo of the way my heart has felt this last week.  However, I also feel that after the rain comes the blessings of the rain... Now I just have to wait for the blessings.

It is kind of ironic that I just blogged about Josh's crime-fighting abilities -- they really need to kick in now!  Friday while I was at work my office was ransacked and my wallet and camera were stolen!  I feel so violated!  What a pain it has been to cancel all my bank accounts and credit cards, not to mention I have to get new insurance cards, a new drivers license and library card!  Not to mention I was only 4 stamps away from getting a FREE MEAL at Cafe Rio!  So to whoever stole my life -- YOU JERK!

That being said, I'll move on.  Josh is thrilled, to say the least, that football season has arrived!

  Saturday we had some friends over to watch the Utah v. Michigan and BYU v. Northern Iowa games and we have started training Alondra at an early age where her allegiance should lie.  If she isn't the cutest thing...

I am DYING to blog about my cousin Cami's beautiful wedding, and especially my awesome, adventurous, oh so fun family vacation up to Park City this week, but first I need to take a nap, AND post some photos of my beautiful sister Carrie, who was a princess and let me take some 'Senior Photos' of her this weekend.  I know I've already dedicated a special post to her beautifulness, but honestly, I can't help myself -- she is so photogenic! Take a look for yourself:

My husband, the crime fighter!

Although I've had a great 2 weeks with loads of stuff I could blog about, I owe Josh a post from 3 weeks ago.  Josh absolutely HATES the fact that I blog (and we won't even mention that I have a facebook for the sake of our marriage...) and mentions it on a regular basis that I am a shame to the Lund family name.  But THEN, all of the sudden, 3 weeks ago Josh actually asked me (very politely even, it was impressive!) if I would commemorate a special post to his amazing skills.  I am sure many of you know by now that Josh is amazingly good looking (that one is quite obvious, especially to him!), can swing a golf club like he was born with it, has super-human strength, may even be immortal actually, knows everything about U.S. History and can even hold his own in a fierce political debate.  So I shouldn't have been surprised when Josh went and pulled off his crime-fighting stunt and, after much research and investigating (we're talking skills to impress C.S.I. here) he caught the guy who had stolen his $52!  "Jose", as we like to call him, has been severely reprimanded by the police and hopefully his criminal ways won't continue where he is now.  Josh has been feeling quite victorious about his snatch, even though he won't be getting his money back...

Josh, Mr. McGruff would be proud to give you an honorary crime fighting badge!

The "KIDS" Question

It seems that since we've been married more than 2 years now, have a place of our own (finally!)and even more especially since the birth of our cute niece Hadley, we can't avoid the "kids" question. "When are we going to see a little Josh walking around?" "So now that you have a house, you're making a nursery for your Jr. Becca, right?" Usually, people get the usual answers to these questions from Josh, such as "Oh, crap, honey, did you leave baby in the trunk again?", "Picturing Becca as fat, hormonal and pregnant makes me throw up", or "Didn't you know, we have a kid, he's just ugly so we leave him in the closet". Usually people quit asking us after a while.

So for all of you wondering why after 2 years we don't have kids (gasp!), I've come to the conclusion that we're scared to death, probably because of the usual reaction I get from a small child. Case in point:

I really am that upsetting!

(This one may be my favorite, as I am getting the world's worst crusty. Who knew i could be so disgusting to a one month old baby!)


Sadly, though, I am not alone in my quest to be hated by all children. Our dear friend Kaycee (pictured with Kaden below) really took the opportunity to tell Josh how she really felt a while ago. Conversation was as follows:
Josh: "Kaycee, do you like the fireworks?"
Kaycee: "Yeah. You're ugly"

Happy Birthday America!

Yes, the above photo is firework vomit.  No other place than Taylorsville Days puts on quite the display, the grand finale this year was quite powerful!  

I guess before I delve into my 4th of July weekend I have to report on the week before (Taylorsville Days).  Ever since Josh and I dated we've made it an event to go, and drag Jami along with us every year!  I love fireworks so, so much, and we had such a great time!  Here's a photo of our love triangle:

Moving on... I must've known what I was doing when I married Josh, since we both happen to share our favorite holiday -- the 4th!  There's not much I don't love about the 4th, one: it's in the summer, which is my favorite, two: you get the day off of work, which is also my favorite, and I love, love LOVE a good fireworks show!  Then there's that thing about it being the greatest country in the world's birthday and whatnot... 

This year we decided to really bring in the holiday with a BANG and spent the wee hours of the morning at the emergency room! I know, we really know how to party!  Poor Josh and his 65 year old insides, I hope that he will be able to get better soon and quit it with the whole internal bleeding bit...

That being said, as we got home from the hospital at about 5:30 a.m. and then had a brunch at his parent's home, we really slept away most of our 4th of July holiday.  And I'm not complaining one bit!  The rest of the weekend we were able to spend a lot of time with Josh's family, with his amazing sister Katie being in town, our niece Hadley being blessed, and Josh's mom's birthday.  Sunday brought yet another visit to the E.R. and really, at this point in our lives, I'm getting pretty used to it.  Here are some pictures from our [mostly] fun and always

 adventurous weekend!

The Lund kidlets.  I am aware that I look like I've gained 240 pounds in this picture, and I'll blame it on the camera lens, yet I am so self-assured that I posted it anyway.  I deserve a medal.  

Being so cute must be hard work.  Oh how I love her!

OUR NEW PLACE!!!

We did it! We are now looking forward to being house-poor! I think this might make us semi-grown-ups. Yeah, that's scary.

I know, I know, our apartment was just so great, how could we ever leave these things:

1. Moldy, rotting bathroom ceiling. It's all the rage these days, I know you wish you had one.

2. 400 pound 4 year old living upstairs. At least that's how large he sounds when he jumps off furniture and runs around at 1 in the morning.

3. Kids target-practicing their golf swing with our bedroom window.

4. Neighbor that parks WAY too close to Josh's car every day.

5. 2 minutes of hot water.

Call us crazy, but we're thinking this owning thing might be an improvement!
And because I knew you were all wondering, YES we will be having plenty of parties. But you only get invited if you come help us paint our giant, 2 story wall! (Josh's neck is ALMOST tall enough to reach, but just not quite!)