Day 9: Girl Power

I love girl nights, shopping, dressing up, chick flicks and chatting. I love being a girl.

A friend in my ward organized these girls' night outs and I am so glad that I have been included. I've only gone to two so far, but I have had so much fun at them. She organized them with most of the newly married women in the ward; only a few have children so we're all right around the same age.

When I moved away for college, I forgot how to meet and become friends with girls. At school, I made good friends with my neighbor Sarah and the next semester we were roommates. Of course, her best friend NaTaya also became my roommate and we three had a blast. After Sarah left us to get married, Taya and I stayed roommates and it was so easy not to meet any other girls for real. At school when I was single, I would meet boys to date and be friends with, and then I had my roommate girlfriends.

Upon getting married, however, I realized that no longer living with girls also meant I no longer had a plethora of girlfriends who I saw all the time. I still have girlfriends on campus, and we hangout with some couple friends, but it's just a different dynamic now.

That's why girl nights are great. I have been able to hangout with girls my own age who live in the same city and who are doing something similar to what I am doing right now. I already have a couple girlfriends here in Miami who I know through Tom's best guy friends, but now we've been able to hangout without the boys. Being a girl is awesome; getting together with girls is even better.

Days 5-8

I'm as lazy as it gets now. I can't do all 14 days, so I've decided to do a lump day.

I love my family.

I'll divide this into three days with three categories: my in-laws, my family, my husband and our future family.

I love my in-laws, my Chambers side. I love my mother-in-law Juanita because she's a sassy lady who loves fashion even more than me. I love that she's stron

g and independent and raised a wonderful son. I love my father-in-law Thomas, Sr. because he's so kind and athletic and can talk to anyone for days.

I love my family; my parents, siblings, sister-in-law and nephew.

My Mom is the best mom in the world. She's the funniest woman ever and has taught me so much, mostly by example. She's cooler than me by far and is always the life of the party. She has such a strong spirit and has helped me out of many tough situations.

My Dad is one part serious, one part hilarious. He has taught me about hard work and has always expected me to try my best. We share a love of cheesy jokes and athletics. He is the coolest Dad because he does it all; he golfs, skis, runs marathons, snowboards, surfs, and even occasionally rides a skateboard.

My older brother Tyler is way cool. When we were young, I showed him up a couple times with my braveness and toughery, but he has showed me up ever since then. I don't know anyone else who would break their knee, not tell their mom, not see a doctor and continue to skateboard on it. He's now an incredible father and has always been a great example to me, except when he teased and harassed me.

My sissy Ashley is hands-down my very best friend ever. We've always done everything together. I have always loved playing with her, talking to her until obscene hours of the night and sharing everything about my life with her. I love her voice, her personality and the fact that she has always looked up to me as I have looked up to her.

My little brother Dallin (also known as Dooks) is an incredible little man. He has the best sense of humor ever. I don't know where he got it; maybe he picked up on all those times we told him repeating his jokes wasn't funny (he was a toddler when he did that) and he became a comedian from our tips. Whatever it was, he's hilarious now.

My sister-in-law Ashli-Jane is so much fun. She's a great workout partner and has a knack at nailing down exactly what other people are like. She is the most diva-like in my family, but that just means she has great style and has blond hair. She has a fantastic personality and is probably the best card player I've ever met.

My nephew Krew is the cutest person I've ever seen. He was premature when he was born and we were all really nervous about his health for a while. Fortunately, he is now a healthy toddler. He is the star of our family because he entertains us whenever he is around.

My own little family currently consists of my sweet husband Thomas and myself. He is the most wonderful man I have ever met. We have almost been married a year now. When we started dating, it was obvious to me that I wanted to marry him. Best. Decision. Ever. His personality complements mine so well. We literally spend all day together. We have the same major at school, currently work together at the same internship, and even have the same calling at church. We spend so much time together and I still never get sick of him.

Simply, I love him. And I'm forever grateful he chose me.

Day 4

Okay, I'm really bad at this every day thing. Forgive me while I catch up to day 8...

I love music. Good music soothes my soul, helps me find strength and pumps me up.

There is nothing quite like running with my iPod in my ears, feeling continually more pumped as I go.

There's nothing like falling asleep to my favorite chill playlist.

And there's hands down nothing like singing along to all my favorite songs on our long road-trips (Miami to Idaho sound long enough?).

Day 3

It's already the 3rd, so Day 2 and 3 today.

For my love today, I would like to talk about the earth. I love the earth. I am so grateful for this earth and all of God's creations.

Today for our internship, Tom and I got to go to the zoo! Cool, I know. We're doing a promotion with the Communication Director at Zoo Miami, so we went and 'scouted out' where we want to shoot. We had so much fun! We found quite a few spots and talked about what we want to do, but mostly we enjoyed God's beautiful creations.

Needless to say, we saw a ton of cool animals. A Bengal tiger, lions, turtles, antelope, a komodo dragon, tons of birds, fish, monkeys, and my favorite of the day- elephants (African and Asian)! I also got to feed a giraffe! Amazing!

Anyway, I am in love with this planet that I live on. Mother nature always amazes me. I have loved all the places on the earth I have been able to see so far and hope to be able to see a great deal more before I'm laid in it. I desperately want to visit every continent, except for the frozen tundra of Antarctica. I'm sure the rest of the world will astound me as much as the it already has.

Also, I'm watching Planet Earth on tv right now. Just reenforcing my love for this planet.

Day 2

Day 2... one day late. My bad!

For day 2 of my 14 Days of Love, I have decided to share my love of my own healthy body. For a Christmas present, Tom's Mom got us gym passes to 24 Hour Fitness. Maybe part of the reason is due to the fact that the last time we were in Miami visiting, Tom and I both gained a bit of weight. We were on vacation, alright?

Either way, I'm grateful to have my gym pass because we don't really live near any parks and jogging outside is basically a no-go because I'd have to go on a crazy busy road. The best part is that our gym is right around the corner, so I can jog or walk to it when it's nice out (which is 90% of the time).

Anyway, I'm in love with the way exercise makes me feel. I always have been, and I'm realizing more and more how important it is for me to keep up a routine.

Most of all, I love my body for all the amazing things I am able to do because I have a strong, healthy one.

I love to run.

I love to snowboard.

I love to longboard and skateboard.

I love to play volleyball.

I love to swim in the ocean.

I love to boogey-board and surf.

I love to walk my dog.

I love to smile.

I love to talk....a lot.

I love to laugh.

I love to breath in fresh air.

I love to eat delicious food.

All in all, I love my body. It allows me to do so many

incredible things.

14 Days of Love

It's the beginning of the season of love. For us, it starts with Valentine's Day. Right after the holiday, it's Tom's parents' anniversary. On the 20th is my birthday! And in March we will celebrate our first year anniversary; I'm so excited! I can't believe it has almost been a year.

Anyway, I decided to do this 14 days of love because I saw it on my friend's blog and I loved it. Also, I have so many people, places and experiences that I love and am grateful for.

So, I will start with the place with the most love in the world. The Temple. I love the Temple and my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

The Orlando Temple with Tom's parents. Soon, there will be one in South Florida too!

The Rexburg Temple. This is the Temple I've gone in the most.

The Salt Lake City Temple. Where Tom and I got engaged.The one that started everything for me. My beloved Mesa Temple.

The Holidays till Now

So, it's been so long since I've posted. Sadly, Tom has been the one really wanting me to update this, so I'm working on it. Anyways, I didn't write about Christmas or New Year's or our cross-country road trip at all. Let's start with Christmas.

We spent Christmas with my family in Gilbert and had a blast. We spent Christmas Eve with my Mom's extended family eating and opening presents to one another. I didn't get to see some of my cousins, but we still had fun. Then on Christmas we opened presents and enjoyed following Krew around because he's the cutest member of our family. We also spent time with our dog Titan who we miss.

Right after Christmas, my family was invited to join the Palmer-Holyoak family at their cabin and go snowboarding. I went with my family and Thomas stayed in Gilbert and spent time with his friend John. I missed him, but our snowboarding was great. Unfortunately, basically all the pictures I have from our vacation were taking on our snowboarding trip (thanks to Blaze for bringing a camera).

Here is a picture of half of the snowboarding group (my siblings- except sis-in-law Ashli because she's pregnant; Dallin's friend Eric; Ashley's friends Blaze, Ryan and Mike).

Here is our snowboarding family minus Ashli, Krew and my Mom. I can't wait to see Krew on the slopes someday!

This is my favorite picture from our trip. It's my sister Ashley and I on the lift!

After Christmas and miserably packing back up our car-again- we left Arizona for Florida. We drove through Arizona, New Mexico and half of Texas in one day. Then we stayed with our friend Tucker at his home in Mississippi (thanks Tucker!). After that, we made it all the way down to Miami and arrived at about 9p.m. New Year's Eve. It was great to see Tom's parents again who we'll be staying with while we are doing our internship.

Now, Thomas and I are working at WLRN; it's the Public Television and Radio station for South Florida. Since we are both studying Communications at BYU-Idaho, we were able to get two positions at the same company for our internship. We work together and are having a lot of fun.

So far, we've been involved with giveaways and promotions of their Facebook Fan Page and Twitter account. We also helped with the broadcast of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Parade in Liberty City. We helped gather information about each organization in the parade. During the event, we helped the hosts get the information so they knew what to say about each group. Despite the rain, it was a lot of fun. We're excited to be doing our internships and are lucky to be in beautiful, warm Miami right now.