Goodbye Florida

We have had so much going on, Ben and Tammy came! YAY! We had a lot of fun. The weather wasn't the greatest on Saturday. We woke up at seven to go get surf lessons from the little surf shop around the corner, it turned out there were rip currents so we weren't able to. We watched the sunrise instead. It was AMAZING! We had a lot of fun shopping when it started raining and watched Harry Potter. We had so much fun.

Leaving here is a little harder than I thought it would be. It seems like it has been a dream being here. I just finished packing up our cute little seventies apartment, and I am actually sad to be leaving the gold leafing, no dishwasher, and red light bathroom. I never thought I would be sad about that but we have so many fun memories here.

I think the ocean is my new best friend. I really am not sure how I can live without it. It is so therapeutic to walk to the beach every day. No matter what I leave happier than when I get there. I will miss the beautiful birds, the fish, the families that you can tell just jumped off the bus and started playing in the water because they are all fully clothed, the surfers, the skim boarders, the sand diggers, palm trees, sand under my feet, my swimming suit, my crazy beach hair, flip flops, sea shells, water as warm as the air, the sound of the waves crashing, boogie boarding, beach tennis, the showers to clean off the sand, and just laying there in the sun. I love having my best friend to go with me every day. It is like heaven on earth.

We are definitely coming back here someday!

More Visitors! YAY!

Sunset walk on the beach. It was honestly one of the most beautiful days we have seen here. The waves were perfect and the sand was completely clean. The water was 80 degrees. We all loved it!


She is such a cute beach babe!
What a fun week we had with Brynley and Marisha! We hadn't seen them in a while so it was great to be able to spend more time with them. It was very nice of them to come all the way here. Brynley is a total beach babe already! She loved feeling the water and kept wanting to just sit in it. She wasn't scared at all by the waves. We loved being able to wake up to a happy little Brynley every morning. We had a lot of fun feeding her and seeing how her cute personality is starting to show. I wish I had a picture of the funny faces she made for us, she made us laugh so hard. I could tell she totally loves making people smile, even when we went shopping she loved when people would smile at her. It was also very fun watching Marisha interact with Brynley, she is such a patient, cute mom. Brynley adores her.

I am so happy that Dane got to play beach tennis with Marisha. He couldn't wait to have another friend to play with at the beach. I couldn't wait for more shopping buddies and friends. We miss you guys! Thank you Taylor for sharing your cute family with us, we can't wait to see everyone again at Christmas!

Visitors

Dave K Holly made that for you at the Keys!

Mani/pedis!

We were so happy Holly and Anna decided to come and visit us! We had so much fun shopping, eating, laughing, talking, sunbathing, swimming, and exploring. I am so grateful for sisters.

Our Trip to Florida Keys

Our friends Cassie and Matt
The sting ray that was a foot away from us. It was so fun to see it, but I am so happy we weren't swimming when we saw it!
There was this cool tree in the middle of the beach. I love all the tropical trees here, they are amazing.

This place honestly was like heaven. There was hardly anyone at this beach and the surroundings were beautiful. We loved soaking up the sun and the whole atmosphere!
We thought the beach was a little rocky until I looked down a little closer at my foot and noticed that it was miniature sea shells. They were so cute! We spent the next hour or so gathering sea shells. The little cork screw ones are my favorite. We also found some that had zebra stripes on them. We have never seen anything like that!
It rained off and on throughout our trip to the Keys, but that meant a beautiful rainbows. We have seen lots of them since we got to Florida, but it is even better when you are driving on a tiny strip of land.
It was hard to believe we are only a short 2 hour drive from here. We felt like we had gone to a different country. The island feel was awesome, by far our favorite place we have visited since we came.

We decided to get up really early, pack a picnic, and go exploring to the Keys with our friends Cassie and Matt, who are also here from BYU doing the internship. We loved every minute of it! The drive there was amazing and it was so cool to drive on a bridge across the ocean. It took us a little while to get to an actual beach. Sometimes the road is the only piece of land you are on. Otherwise there were tropical plants that went right up to the water. We finally stopped and asked the locals where the best beaches were, and we were very happy with the beach they led us to.

We have really enjoyed our time so far here in Florida. Dane is enjoying his job, he is getting the hang of it more, and works with nice people. I have been trying to find things to do! I recently started indexing and I am loving it. It is very fun to see pieces of U.S. history and help to find people.

We both try to enjoy our surroundings as much as possible, especially since we will be going back to Utah in December. We try to walk to our beach at least once a day. We love feeling the sand under our feet and the water is always nice and warm. We also figured out we can get shrimp from our local grocery store and have them steam it with the most delicious seasoning. Amazing!

Florida

So! I finally have enough time to blog! It has been a whirlwind these past couple of weeks.  Dane graduated from BYU and the accounting program! I am so proud of him! He worked so hard for so long, so it was really fun to get to see him in his cap and gown.  It was especially fun because he got to graduate with his mom. Way to go Julie!! I got my wisdom teeth out, I worked the last day at my awesome job, and then we drove straight through to Florida, 38 hours!  Matt and Dane were the driving warriors. That is what I would call them because Dane probably drove 18 hours and Matt drove from the hours of 12 a.m. to 7 a.m. which is the hardest time to drive.  I barely managed to drive about 4, and it was in the middle of the day, and the whole time I was trying not to fall asleep. I know I am pathetic!

We arrived at our apartments on Sunday and got all settled in. We could hardly believe our eyes that this beautiful beach was just around the corner from us!  There are palm trees and tropical plants outside of our door and every time we go outside we can see all the geckos scatter.  A couple of days ago I saw a frog that was literally the size of a pea, I thought it was a bug until I got a little closer and saw it hopping! 

Dane is enjoying his first week of work for Citi, he loves being able to come home at night and not have any homework.  As soon as he gets home we all put on our suits and go swimming.  Matt and I spend our days trying to find jobs and work on our tans. So far I am beating Matt in the tan war and that is pretty hard to do.   

Fall Fun

A couple of weeks ago Dane and I went to the BYU-USU football game. We met up with Jacque, Dave, Ben, Tammy, and Matt. We did not all get to sit by each other but it was really fun. It was the perfect weather. We all went out to eat at Cafe Sabor afterward because we were all starving! Thanks everyone for the fun date night! By the way I am not sure who that guy is behind us that was the only picture I got of us at the game so I am a little mad that he did that.



Last week I met Camilla at her house and we went to my Grandma Rudd's house to learn how to make her famous rolls and give her a pedicure. It was so much fun! She really has a gift for making those rolls. I watched every step of what she did but I am pretty sure that I can't do it on my own. It was so funny to listen to her instructions for the rolls. She walked us through making them and she kept saying things like, "One or one and a half cups of butter." It was hilarious! I guess she has exceptions to her recipe depending on the size of the batch she is making. Great! How do we duplicate that?? They ended up turning out great, they tasted so good! She has always been such a good example to me and a great friend. It was so fun to give her a pedicure and hear stories about her life. I loved spending the day with Camilla, Jackson, Logan, my Mom, and Grandma!

I officially suck!

It honestly feels weird to blog right now I had to think about how to do it. We have kind of been through a whirlwind the past couple of months. Thank you Holly, Jacque, and Tammy for inspiring me. Good news, our camera was just underneath the passenger seat in our car! So, I do have some pictures of us in Newport, and also of Brooklyn when she came to stay with us. Not too much is new with us, Dane just started his first semester in the Accounting Program and it has been pretty tough, I don't see him all day, then he studies through the night. He is such a hard worker and he really enjoys what he is learning. We are planning on staying one more year after this so he can do a one year, integrated master's program through BYU. It seems like forever long but I know he will be done with school after that, so it will all be worth it.

I am still managing a guy salon in Orem and it is keeping me very busy. It really has been a fun place to work I love all the girls I work with and I have met some pretty crazy people. i.e. one of my clients told me one day that he was never going to die because he was learning how to twinkle himself, he told me that he could even go as far as resurrection but if he told me more he would have to kill me. I was fine with changing the subject after I realized he was totally serious. He said there is a link to another world of people who have mastered that and it is through Oprah's website. Hilarious!! Very creepy at the same time so I told all of my other clients so in case I was murdered they would know why and who it was. Oh the joys of working with the public. For the most part I have a lot of fun getting to know people from all walks of life and making people look good every day!

Last week my mom, dad, Cat, and Anna all came to see me on my day off. It was so much fun! First we met up with my dad after flying in from DC for lunch. Then all of us girls went shopping for Cat's homecoming dress. We litterally shopped till we dropped, found a great dress, all the accessories, then at the last minute thought of taking it all back and starting over. Anyone who knows our family would think that is funny. We were all just tired and Cat ended up loving the dress? (I hope you do!) We ended with dinner at Cafe Rio. It was so fun to see them and spend the day thanks so much for coming!

Two weeks ago Dane and I had a really fun weekend in Park City with his whole extended family to celebrate grandma and grandpa Hardester's fiftieth wedding anniversary. It was so much fun to see everyone! On Saturday we went on the zipline, alpine coaster, and slide. Later that night we enjoyed a meal courtesy of a fun family tradition the Hardester's enjoyed growing up. For family home evening grandma and grandpa Hardester would give all of their kids one dollar and they would go to the grocery store. Everybody could spend that dollar on any food they wanted, it just had to be something that everyone could share. So, all thirty of us took ten dollars to the grocery store and picked out our favorite food to share with everyone for dinner. We all prepared it and brought it together to eat. I had so much fun! I loved seeing what people picked out and trying tons of yummy food. What a fun tradition!!