Anniversary Time

On Sunday, we went and celebrated our anniversary which I will write about as you scroll down.  But our actual anniversary day, Kade had to work, but I thought I would make him a yummy dinner anyway for when he got home(he never likes to eat a meal late at night).  We had salmon with brown rice and steamed spinach, and I made a apple crisp with vanilla ice cream for a treat after.    

 Kade loved his dinner, he was surprised.  But I was even more surprised when he came through the door with a big bunch of roses! :)  Made my whole night! 

 I had a little tiny bunch of silk flowers that I had put in the middle of the table, but those were soon replaced with this much more beautiful arrangement!

We were able to attend the Columbia temple for our anniversary as well, which I really loved.  It was so nice to go to the temple.  Its been difficult to go because Kade is so busy with the office and the temple sessions don't start until 9, which puts us 12:30 getting back to the apartments and their meeting starts at 12, so we haven't been able to do it yet, but we were able to this once and I'm so glad! :)

 

Drayton Hall! Kade surprised me and got a package deal on the Drayton Hall and the Magnolia Plantation!  He knew I've been wanting to go to both of them so that's what we did.  Drayton Hall is one of the oldest original plantation homes in the US. 

 Drayton Hall has been preserved, and will continue to be preserved, not restored. They wanted to keep everything original.

 Even the paint is original from way back!  And the stairs were awesome! This place was completed in 1742, so its 271 years old!

 It was cool seeing this home and picturing how the people lived back then. 

 It was also interesting hearing the facts about the slaves(or servants).  They were always kept behind closed doors unless they were serving meals and things like that. 

After Drayton, we went to the Magnolia Plantation.  We actually didn't go inside this home.  We spent our day out in the gardens.

 The gardens felt like they would never end, which I was very much ok with.  I think we saw 10 different bridges that crossed water.  The bridges were everywhere and they were beautiful!

 They had this cool wildlife overlook that you could climb 4 flghts of stairs to get to.  It was cool to look out over the Ashley River.  It was also nice to be above the trees for once! :)

 I think this was my favorite bridge, only because of the trees that hang right over your head and the green swamps below and you could see the Ashley River through an opening in the trees to the right. 

 There was actually a petting zoo at Magnolia Plantation, and this deer decided that I  tasted good, and then she decided that she wanted to eat my dress! :)  She was cute.

 I feel like South Carolina is kind of a tropical feel.  It is very humid that's for sure!  Its pretty hot but not unbearable yet.  I'm sure that come July, it will be SUPER hot. I'm glad it wasn't too hot for our visit here.

 In this picture, there is an alligator on the very bottom right of the pic.  We didn't realize he was there when we took the pic, but he snuck his way into my photo!

 I also loved this bridge.  So pretty!

 And another bridge!  I'm not sure how much we walked but probably a few miles at least!

 The edge of the gardens is bordered by the Ashley River.  I was taking pictures and I saw and heard something come to the surface.  It was dolphins!  They kept coming up to the surface for a while so we sat and watched them :) So fun!

 In this pic, you can actually see two bridges, one on the left through the trees and one on the right.

 We saw lots more alligators again!  Only this time we got even closer to one.....Kade could've held a yard stick and reached out and touched it!  It kinda made me nervous!

 Alligator behind Kade!

 I love the trees here.  I can't get enough of them.  I love all the moss that grows on them.

 

This peacock was showing off for everyone that day!  He just kept fanning out, so I took advantage of the moment and got lots of pics of him!  Fun day!  Thanks Kade for a great anniversary!

Happy Anniversary

Where did 8 years go?  Happy Anniversary to my eternal companion and love of my life.  Its been the best 8 years of my life.  We've shared ups and downs, happy and sad, crazy and......more crazy and SO MUCH FUN! Looking back, everything that we've gone through, even the hard times have been a privilege!   Kade is my rock and I am his.  I feel we have, from day one, always played on the same team, and worked together.   I can't help but look back on our lives and especially each year on our anniversary, to see how far we've come.  I knew I loved Kade when I married him....but sometimes that love is indescribable now. 
I remember when we started out, we lived in a little two bedroom apartment (owned by Kade's brother) with brown carpet.  I remember cooking meals in that little place and shopping at garage sales to find some furniture to fix the place up nice.  I remember getting free couches from Cherish's friend Jill(which we still have, now in our basement and still very much appreciate). I also remember having a BBQ with Kade on the back steps of our apartment with our little charcoal BBQ that I think we got for our wedding! And I remember getting roses at that same doorstep.....I followed the pedals and they led me to the bouquet!  That's were we started our little family, just the two of us.  Sometimes, we live in the moment, but we don't realize how good the moments are until they're in the past!   I look back on those days and they are such wonderful memories for me!   We've always made wherever we are, our HOME.
We then moved to Orem and bought our first home(townhome) together!  It was awesome!  I remember going from our 2 bedroom apartment with one bathroom, to a 3 bedroom townhome with 1 1/2 baths felt like I had just moved into a mansion!  That place was so fun! We met so many wonderful people, who are still our friends to this day.  We had so many fun times there.  I remember, Christmases there, where I got my beautiful picture of the Savior.  And our Charlie Brown Christmas tree that the needles all fell off of!  I remember having our townhome friends over for fun dinners, and Christmas parties!  I remember Kade carrying me up the stairs to put me to bed, OFTEN because I fall asleep during movies!     I remember game nights of canasta and nertz.....always winning canasta and always losing at nertz!  I remember going over to the Orem park and laying a blanket out to play games, pretty much every Sunday during the summer.  I remember going to the temple often with Kade cause we lived 15 minutes from Provo and 20 from Timp.  So many wonderful memories, and again, we made it our HOME.
After Orem, we moved to good ol Fairview!  With exceptions of summer sales, in which we move to different locations during the summer months, which have been Arkansas, Hawaii, California, Texas, and now South Carolina.  All of which we have absolutely loved and have had many wonderful experiences!  We both knew that we wanted to be back in Sanpete county and we finally made it!  We bought our home there in Fairview and I remember the day we moved our stuff in.  Brandon was there to help us unload our borrowed snowmobile trailer full of stuff!  We had to remodel a lot!  So after we moved our stuff in, we set up for remodel mode for about 30 days!  WHEW!  It was such a long time....but I sure had fun knocking out a wall with a crowbar!  This is where some of our fondest memories have happened.  This is where Kade gave me my beautiful Shilo puppy who I just adore!  This is where we have worked along side each other on the basement, and yard to make this house our HOME. This is where pranks happen.....where I pour cold water on Kade in the shower and he holds me down and tickles me as I yell, "STOP" and he says, "You must like it, your laughing!"  This is where we have 'slide across the hardwood floor' contests in our soft socks to see who goes the furthest.   This is where my brother moved in with us, whom I love with all my heart, and many talks and tears were shared with him.  This is also where I learned that I could love someone elses kids as if they were my own.    Hopefully its HOME for.....ever! 
One of our greatest treasures has been,  being able to attend the temple once a week, wherever possible.  This has brought the spirit of our Father In Heaven, into our home.  The temple has always been one of the highest priorities in our lives and we have felt the blessings because of it.   We truly love our Father in Heaven and our Savior Jesus Christ.
We look forward to the day that we will be blessed with children.  This has been something that has not come easy for us and though we have tried for many years now, we know that we will be blessed with children some day, whatever the circumstances may be.  That is something that we very much look forward to, something that we know will add blessings to our lives. 
It has been a wonderful ride!  A wonderful 8 years!  I look forward to the next 8 and more!  I LOVE you Kade!  Thank you for making my life so happy!   Happy Anniversary!

 

Folley Beach

On Sunday, we were wondering what to do because we were both kinda tired and felt like we needed a nap....so we napped for about an hour and thought we would go see a park that's not very far from our house.  We took Jon and Shaylee and baby Ecko with us.  The park was really pretty, I still need to post pics of it, but it only took us about 20 minutes to see the whole thing. So then we were wondering what else to do so we decided to go see Folley Beach which is only abut 45 min away.  It was so fun!  Shaylee and I were happy to be on the beach!  And Kade and Jon had fun throwing the football back and forth on the beach.

I LOVED this pier!  I've actually always wanted to go to a big pier and take pictures underneath like this, so I'm happy we discovered this place! Its beautiful here!

The pier was SO long!  We walked out to the end of it so we were clear out in the ocean. At the end of the pier, they had picknic tables and a couple vending machines to plan a day there.  There was also an upper deck of the Pier that we were on pictured above.  I loved it cause the wind was more strong up there and you also had a birds eye view of everything.   People were fishing off the pier catching sharks!  We saw two people reel in sharks while we were there.  Pretty neat!

Jon was nice and snapped a pic of us from the upper deck.

The beautiful Pier

I'm so glad we came on Memorial weekend because they had the flags out and of course I'm very passionate about the US of A!!!  It was beautiful to see all the flags lining the pier! 

Out on Folley Beach

Flags lining the Pier

Happy Memorial Day to all!  So grateful for the sacrifices that have been made and continue to be made in our behalf. I feel very blessed to live in the land of the free and the home of the brave! 

Jon and Shaylee!  It was so fun having them come with us.  I LOVE baby Ecko!  She is such a good baby.  She never crys only when she's hungry!  I hope I have a baby that good :) 

Ecko is one of the prettiest little girls I've ever seen!  She's got a little bit of Japaneese in her, which make her eyes just beautiful!  I love holding her, and I've been around her so much that I pretty much know exactly what she needs and when she needs it!  I'm kind of her back up mom if Shaylee isn't around! LOL!!!  Fun little girl!

Old Sheldon Church Ruins

 On Sunday, we went and saw this old beautiful place.  Its the Old Sheldon Church Ruins.  I actually saw this picture on a calendar out here and wondered where it was and it ended up being not very far from us, so we decided to pay it a visit.  There was actually a bride getting her bridal pictures done while we were here.  Its a pretty popular picture spot, which doesn't surprise me!

 This church was built back in 1751 and is the original structure.  It was burned during a raid by General Augustine Prevost during the last  parts of the Civil War.

 These little frogs hop EVERYWHERE underneath your feet.  I just had to not look down because I wouldn't be able to walk in the grass without stepping on one! :(  Yuck!

 Kade being a monkey.....

 Both of us being monkeys........

 Such a pretty place!  I think new family pics here would be awesome!

 You can see the bride off to the left of my pic. 

 Love these in black and white. 

If only walls could talk.....We could learn so much! There would be many stories told about this place I'm sure!  I love history!

Cypress Gardens

 Well, I can now check the Cypress Gardens off my list, however, that doesn't mean I won't go back.  This was the number one place that I wanted to visit!   I loved this place so much!  It was gorgeous!  I couldn't stop taking pictures.  I wanted to go here last week but it was raining and I knew the whole experience wouldn't be as good, and I'm glad I waited!  Its about 25 minutes from our house so not too far, and I've been reading about it.  Its a big park area, that has the swamps, and other cool stuff to see like hundreds of butterflies, crocodiles, exotic turtles and lots of other stuff. 

 It was so nice because we got there and they told us that we could just go jump on a boat and row ourselves around or we could pay a tour guide $5.00 to row us, and I definitely wanted to TAKE MY TIME so we did the self tour.  It was just the two of us in a little old wooden boat!  Super cool!  We were out on the water for probably an hour.  You didn't have to rush, you could take as long as you want.  There were bridges that we went underneath as we went through the gardens. 

 This was actually after our boat ride....I'm not really going in order.

 We saw alligators, 6 of them to be exact.  3 adults and 3 babies, this was in the wild out in the swamps with us. This was definitely the highlight! We were hoping that we'd see some.  They are so camouflage in all of the lily pads.  Yikes! 

 Baby alligator!  They make these scream sort of noises and we wondered why, someone told us that it means they are kinda nervous and that their moms would not be far away from them! Oh boy!  Its pretty weird walking around a big swamp area where alligators roam. 

 I've ALWAYS loved nature and flowers.  I feel like I take so many pics of them, but I just love how beautiful they are!  In fact, I was taking this photo right before we saw the first alligator, so I'm surprised that it turned out.

 This was at the dock in our boat together before we took off.  The park worker was nice enough to take a quick pic of both of us!

 It was one of the best Mother's Day's ever for me!  Kade was so awesome to take me out and have fun!  He did a good job rowing us!  We only hit like 3 trees! haha!  ......and we didn't sink, so it was a success!

 So here's the story of us seeing our first alligator:  We are rowing along, very slowly.  I am taking pictures, of course.  We are headed towards an old bridge.  I'm in the middle of taking a picture of a lily blossom, and Kade says, "CIARA, ALLIGATOR, ALLIGATOR!!"  I say, "Shut up! Where!??"  my heart about came out of my chest!  I whirled around and saw the alligator cross the trail that heads over the bridge, and down into the water by our boat.  He starts to swim towards our boat......by this time, I say, "UUMMMM, Kade? I don't know how I feel about this......"  We are both just starring at this thing swimming towards us.  Then, the alligator turned away from our boat and started going behind us! FEW!!!!  I never thought I would have an encounter like that!  They are so sneaky too!

 Mr. Alligator swimming by our boat.  It was really cool to see out in the wild like that! 

 The are so long!  This one was about 5-6 feet long.  Plenty long for me! 

 It seemed like there were endless lily pads!  They were so pretty!

 My cute boat rower!  He did an awesome job!  He knows me too well.  We didn't go too fast cause he knew that I wanted to see EVERYTHING and take my time.

FUN DAY!

 I had to throw these last two in here.  Scenes from the notebook of course.  A lot of the show was filmed here in South Carolina and these scenes were filmed here in the Cypress Gardens. There is a place in the movie called Sea Brook, and it is also not far from here.  I want to go see that too!  And I was talking to a lady in church and she said that the big fancy plantation homes that where in the movie are also here...a must see as well.    There are actually a lot of movies that have been filmed here in the Cypress Gardens, another one being "The Patriot" with Mel Gibson.