I turned 22 in may, and mat surprised me with a trip to disneyland! now for those of you that don't know mat, this is a big deal. not the whole "surprise" thing, he's actually quite good at surprises. but the whole disneyland thing. he hates disneyland! I've been asking him to go to disneyland for as long as I can remember, and he always shuts the idea down for two reasons. 1, its a rip off, and 2, there aren't very many thrilling rides, which are his favorite kind. so I was completely caught off guard when mat woke me up early on the saturday before my birthday and showed me the hotel we'd be staying at, and told me to pack up for a weekend in california. unfortunately, I babysat my niece the night before we left, and she had a pretty nasty stomach virus, which I ended up getting on the day we had to go to disneyland. we got to disneyland, but weren't able to go on very many rides. mat's mom made us dinner reservations at Ariel's Grotto, which was delicious!

in june, mat turned 24! we both had requested the day off work, so I woke him up much earlier than he wanted to be, brought him a los betos breakfast burrito (the best!), and had plans to take out the jetskis to the lake with kacey and karl, but one of the jetskis weren't working. so after much deliberation, we decided to wait for garrison to get home from football practice, and bring him and jake to big surf for the day. so much fun! for the record, mat and I did not plan on matching.


in august, I went to utah for a family reunion, and when I got back, mat surprised me (homeboy is good with surprises!) by starting to paint our cabinets. don't have pictures of that yet, but it was a treat. the cabinets are mostly done, except the trim on the top, some wood panels, and new hardware.

the weekend after my family reunion, I got my wisdom teeth out. not fun! we would have pictures, if I didn't make mat delete them all. took me a good week and a half to get 100% back into shape.

mat became famous during the first couple weeks in august, painting hashtags on his belly at diamondback games with all of his friends. since the first game they went to, they've filmed promos for fox sports, and been on the 12 news morning show twice. I've got a local celebrity on my hands!

over labor day weekend, the shaker/mckinnon family decided to do their "kristi trip". its a trip they take every few years in remembrance of their sister, Kristi, who passed away from breast cancer a few years ago. this year, they decided to do a stay-cation at the arizona grand resort. it was a lot of fun! the hotel had a huge water park with two 8 story slides. I went down one, got the worst wedgie of my life and I'm pretty sure an enema, and stuck to the lazy river after that. it was good to spend time with family though.


on september 5th, mat and I celebrated our 6 month! that sounds like such a mile stone, but in the broad scheme of things, 6 months is such a short period of time. mat planned out our night, taking me to the art gallery he proposed at to see if there was anything we wanted to buy for our house, then taking me to benihana, the restaurant that we ate lunch at before he proposed. unfortunately, the art gallery was closed, so we improvised and went to see super 8 at the dollar theaters. movie for two for $4? not bad!


and for the final piece of news! today, I turned in my dental hygiene application. hallelujah! the bad news of it, rio salado has decided to close their program for the 2012 cycle in order to build new facilities for the program. now, mcc takes 20 students, phoenix college takes 22, and rio salado typically takes 36. with rio salado closing next year, there are 36 students ahead of me on the waiting list that could've started there, leaving an open spot at either mcc or phoenix for me. now, those students will be taking up the spots at mcc and phoenix, leaving me on the waiting list until 2013. bummer! the counselor said that weird things have happened, and maybe I could get into 2012, but with the number of applications he's seen, I'm most likely looking at 2013.

I'm disappointed. but on the brighter side, this lets mat and I get even more set to live off of only his income, we'll have more of a savings to sit back on in case something happens while I'm playing full time student. but until then, I'm going to try to find a job in a dental office to pass the time. so, here's to the next couples years and crossing my fingers that I get in 2012!